Saint Paul church at Kali Limenes
On the hill to the west of Kali Limenes beach you will meet the chapel of Saint Paul (Agios Pavlos), built in 1911 on the site of an Earlier Christian church to honor Saint Paul who stopped in Kali Limenes during his journey to Rome. Next to the church, you can visit a small cave, where Apostle Paul is said to have lived for two years, before continuing his journey to Rome. Indeed, Paul himself reports in Acts that he once landed in “Kali Limniones” after a big storm, but it is unlikely that he lived in the region for that long.
This place is very important for the Greek Orhtodox Church, that the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew A visited Kali Limenes twice; on November 15, 1992 and October 16, 2008.
“… we sailed to the lee of Crete opposite Salmone … and came to a place called Fair Havens (Kali Limenes), near the town of Lasea … after the fast [Day of Atonement in late September] … the majority decided that we should sail on, hoping to reach Phoenix and winter there … so they weighed anchor and sailed along the [southern] shore of Crete … the ship was caught by the storm … we passed to the lee [south] of a small island called Cauda, we were hardly able to make the lifeboat secure.” (Acts 27:7-16; NIV translation)
