Mark Arrington:  

Single with no children, I have lived in Dallas since the early 80's where I have worked many years for Stewart Title. A major interest: travel...I have visited about 30 countries in Europe, the Middle East and South America. My favorite area of travel is the Mediterranean. Favorite places in my travels include the French Riviera, including Monaco, the Greek Islands (Corfu, Crete, Mykonos, Patmos, Rhodes, Santorini), Italy (four times), the Costa del Sol (the lower southeast coast of Spain from Malaga to Gibraltar), the Balearic Islands (Ibiza, Mallorca, etc.), Corsica, Sardinia, Malta, Cyprus, Lebanon, and just about anywhere I've been in the Mediterranean. I have also enjoyed visiting the magnificent monastery of Mont St. Michel on the Normandy coast of France, Paris (twice), Switzerland, Austria, Liechtenstein, Istanbul and Rio de Janiero. One of my most rewarding trips was to Russia, where I experienced Moscow, St. Petersburg and the Golden Ring, an architecularly-rich area of towns ouside Moscow including Sergiev Posad, Rostov Veliky aka Rostov the Great, Yaroslavl, Kostromo, Vladimir and Suzdal. In Sergiev Posad, I visited the Monastery of the Holy Trinity and St. Sergius, one of the most important sites in the Russian Orthodox Church. The Golden Ring is known for its numerous and beautiful onion-domed churches and I had the opportunity to visit many of those. In Moscow, I visited the well-known and much-photographed St. Basil's Cathedral on Red Square, as well as the many famous churches of the Kremlin. Another Moscow highlight was Lenin's tomb and viewing the founder of the Soviet Union in his glass coffin. In St. Petersburg, I visited the summer and winter palaces of the czars. Other interesting destinations include Albania, Portugal, Gibraltar and it's famous and massive "rock", Morocco, Madeira, and the Canary Islands. Drove on the left side of the road in Malta and Cyprus. Caught on quick...you just have to keep thinking left at all times. Driving on the left side, though, always gives you the sick feeling that you're going to run into someone head-on on a curve. Other memorable experiences in my travels include being in Philadelphia on July 4, 1976 for the official Bicentennial ceremony at Independence Hall. President Ford was the main speaker and Charlton Heston was Master of Ceremonies for the very moving program which I consider one of the great experiences of my life. Also, being at the D-Day beaches and the American cemetery in Normandy, France, burial place of our D-Day veterans, and arriving in London two days after the wedding of Charles and Diana, and seeing the city as it had been decorated for the occasion. One of the best experiences in my European travels was taking the TGV, France's fast train, from Paris all the way to Nice on the French Riviera. The train reaches speeds up to about 170 MPH in open country, and is seen in the Tom Cruise movie Mission Impossible. The Paris to Nice route took us through such cities as Lyon, Avignon, Marseilles, Toulon and Cannes, as well as many different French landscapes before we reached the railhead at Nice. One of my all-time best experiences while traveling in this country was walking across the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco just before dusk. It was an exhilirating experience walking from north to south along the east sideof the bridge, being high above San Francisco Bay, and enjoying a great view of the city and bay area! You never know who you'll run into in your travels: on the Costa del Sol in Spain in 2002, I walked off the elevator in my hotel and right into Dusty Martin of Leo Martin Chevrolet in Lake Jackson. He and his wife were visiting Spain with another couple and were staying in the same hotel with me. Small world!! It was also great to visit Kandy Shreves (B'Port Class of '72; she finished early with the Class of '71) at her home in Capri, Italy on my 2003 trip to Capri and the Amalfi Coast. On that trip, I stayed for about a week in the beautiful seaside town of Positano, seen in the movie Under the Tuscan Sun, while checking out the scenic Amalfi Coast. A very enjoyable experience recently (April, 2008) was meeting and talking with Charlize Theron when she was here for the AFI-Dallas Film Festival. She took a question from me and I talked with her during a question-answer session. Afterward I got to meet and speak with her. In her relatively short movie career (from the mid-90's), she has worked with an impressive list of actors including Al Pacino, Robert DeNiro, James Spader, Kenneth Branagh, Bill Paxton, Johnny Depp, Keanu Reeves, Ben Affleck, Gary Sinise, James Caan, Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon, Edward Norton, Donald Sutherland, Geoffrey Rush, John Lithgow, Kevin Bacon, Tommy Lee Jones, Michael Caine, Billy Bob Thornton, Patrick Swayze, Will Smith, Woody Harrelson, Dennis Hopper and John Corbett. Her many films include 2 Days in the Valley, Celebrity, The Devil's Advocate, The Astronaut's Wife, The Cider House Rules, Sweet November, Reindeer Games, Trapped, The Italian Job, Waking Up in Reno, Monster (won the Oscar for Best Actress), Head in the Clouds, Aeon Flux, North Country (nominated for Best Actress), The Burning Plain,Young Adult, and Prometheus. In Waking Up in Reno, she worked with two now-deceased stars: actress Natasha Richardson (The Parent Trap), who died after a skiing accident in March, 2009 and was the wife of actor Liam Neeson, and actor Patrick Swayze (Dirty Dancing), who lost his battle with cancer in September, 2009. , In the fall of 2008, being an avid fan of the Dallas TV series, I attended the show's 30th Anniversary party at Southfork. I joined a line of people waiting to greet the show's stars as they got out of their limos and got to speak with cast members Larry Hagman, Patrick Duffy, Linda Gray, Steve Kanaly, Susan Howard, Ken Kercheval, Charlene Tilton, Mary Crosby, Audrey Landers and Sheree J. Wilson. (J.R., Bobby, Sue Ellen, Ray, Donna, Cliff, Lucy, Kristin, Afton and April) In early 2009, I ...Expand for more