I visited it at the time when they were refurbing it (early 90s I think; big international effort). At that point the frescoes were quite badly damaged, with graffiti in Greek with occasional dates in the 1880s. They got it back to looking like new for a while, but I never saw it like that. It was much more badly damaged a few years ago by Islamist vandals.

The isolated location was probably intended to keep women out.