Brotherhood above the sea

Simonopetra, or the Simonos Petra Monastery, home of the all-male autonomous community Agion Oros or Holy Mountain, standing on the peninsula of Mount Athos in northern Greece.

THE medieval monastery clings almost impossibly to sheer cliffs high above the shimmering turquoise of the Aegean Sea.

Rising from the rugged granite rock, its walls enclose a diverse Christian Orthodox community.