Stavromenos monastery at Avgeniki
On the day of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (September 14) celebrates the Monastery of Stavromenos located just outside the village Avgeniki, province Malevyzi, next to the picturesque settlement Vlahiana. The deserted monastery is one of the many monasteries founded in Crete during the Venetian domination and reaching their heyday till the arrival of the Turks, after which the monastery was slowly deserted. Today we meet some remains of the monastery buildings (part of the walls of monk cells), a base of a limestone-carved winepress, and a trough. Around the church, we see many trees, vineyards, and olive groves.
The temple does not bear traces of frescoes. What made this temple very special is the cypress tree that had grown from just the roof of the temple. None of the older residents could remember exactly when and how it sprouted and that was considered sacred and miraculous. The cypress of Stavromenos continued to be alive till the mid-1970s, when repairment works on the old roof of the temple reduced the moisture of the roof and the tree dies. The trunk still stands popping out of the roof.
