We made it to Cappadocia at around 11am, rented a car and headed over to Goreme to grab a meal. I slept only 3 hours last night - partly jetlag, partly overdoing it yesterday.

So I was a little grumpy, tired and hungry. However, the lovely couple at Cancan served us a delicious meal that perked me right up. We were given a number of free sides, a basket of bread and our order. Turkish cuisine is fairly meat heavy so we were delighted to see a grilled vegetable platter. The vegetables and sis tawook were well seasoned and the sides that included sigara boregi (fried cheese rolls), cacik and acili ezme were all delicious.

Satisfied and more awake, we checked into our hotel - Jacobs cave suites. That's right, we are living in a cave suite. Since it is low season, we even got a free upgrade. The room is warm and lovely (it's really cold in Cappadocia) and we even have a small patio.

The front desk person Ismail was super helpful and drew out itineraries for us. He also arranged for a famed hot air balloon ride for tomorrow morning (fingers crossed for clear skies).

Since we were exhausted and it's cloudy, we decided that we were gonna stick to one thing today - hike the Rose Valley trail. Hence the title of my post. I have never been on a hike so gorgeous and also so mysterious. We hiked a bunch, saw a lot of churches and structures, enjoyed breathtaking views but the trail markings were so bad, that I'm really not sure if we did it all. However, I'm going to share a sampling of pictures.

And yes, that last picture is from outside the cross church on the trail where there is a juice stand - definitely enjoyed the orange and pomegranates combo!

After sunset - which we didn't catch because of cloudy skies, we headed back to our room to freshen up before having dinner at Wooden Spoon Cave Restaurant. The ambience was beautiful and we got to sit on cushions on the floor as we enjoyed our meal. The meal included mezze and a Cappadocian specialty - pottery kebab where meat is slow cooked in a clay pot and then served with theatrics. Don't believe me? Here's a video!!!

I am falling asleep while writing this blog so apologies in advance for any weirdness you may see in the writing. I'm off to bed with lights shining in tree lanterns all over Cappadocia!