Saint George of the Mountain

"After climbing the 401 steps that start from the Fields and walking on path 7 for 1,100 meters, we will encounter Agios Georgios tou Vounou, in an environment dotted with sharp white rocks. It is a fortress-monastery complex that was built on the site of an early Christian Basilica. The mosaic floor and some column capitals from the Basilica are preserved today. The monastery was renovated in 1759, and in 1761, with a Patriarchal seal, it became stauropegic (i.e. it came under the Ecumenical Patriarchate). Under the Catholicos of Agios Georgios, there is an underground carved crypt - chapel (from the 18th century) of Agios Charalambos with the only spring on the island. In the last decades before 2010, the Monastery had fallen into disrepair and many of its cells had begun to collapse. With co-financing from the National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF), it was fully renovated in 2010, through the program ""Restoration of the Monastery of Saint George of the Mountain in Kastellori