Crete: Hania Prefecture Overview Page Eighteen

The Rhodopou Peninsula

The Rhodopou Peninsula is wonderful hiking country, though you can drive the short distance to Afrata, on a paved road which then becomes dirt. Near the first short stretch is the 17th century monastery Moni Gonia, (right) which sits up over the sea. (Open in summer Mon-Fri and Sun 8am-12:30pm/4-8pm; Sat 4-8pm;winter daily 3:30-5:30pm;free, no shorts allowed) Turkish cannonballs are still visible, stuck in the walls, and there are post-Byzantine icons.

There's a small museum, in which some of them are kept, and a chapel with others, as well as a 14th century church on the nearby cliffs, with frescoes. The little cove down below may well be restricted for use by the few monks still resident in the monastery, so you might want to ask before descending to take a swim.

Afrata is very small, with a few kafeneia, but there's a paved road leading down to a cove near a gorge. Many people hike to the Church of Aghios Ioannis Gionis on the west side of the peninsula on 29 August (the saint's day of St. John the Baptist), a major pilgrimage for the religious, and for male babies named Yiannis (John), a time of collective baptism. The walk takes two or three hours (one way), leaving from Rodhopos, which has a paved road to it, though you can walk from a side road off the main road from Kolimbari, (see above in section about the Allied cemetery near Souda Bay).

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