The province of Kydonia, i.e. the wider area of current Chania city, hosted a large number of monasteries and hermitages. Especially the isolated and inhospitable Cape Akrotiri or Melecha was home to dozen monks and hermits who lived a strict monastic life in caves and small convents, following the footsteps of Saint John the Hermit. Unlike Akrotiri, the fertile plane around Chania hosted many monasterial dependencies owing very large areas of olive groves and vineyards.