The Koza Cave hotel in Goreme is probably the coolest and nicest, most unique hotel I have ever stayed in. Hands down. And one of my best hotel experiences.

Craig and I decided to treat ourselves to one night of luxury on our backpacking trip around Turkey. The cave hotels in Cappadocia only let guests onto their roof terraces, and having seen lots of travel content creators we love doing this, we couldn’t resist a piece of the action.

Based on @traveltomtom saying that Koza Cave Hotel had the highest roof top in Cappadocia, we decided on staying there. So whilst still in Istanbul we booked to spend our last night in Cappadocia here. We were worried they would run out of space, what with being a small hotel with only 10 rooms. However…

We got our first ever upgrade!

We have been travelling together for nearly 3 years now and never have we been given an upgrade for anything. Countless flights, hotels, never anything.

But the day we checked into Koza Cave hotel was our lucky day! Only one other room had been booked, and as I had said in my email requesting an airport transfer, this was our last night in Cappadocia. So very generously, Ozgur who checked us in had upgraded us to the Deluxe Suite.

The Deluxe Suite

We were so happy we couldn’t believe our luck! The room was incredible, with a bedroom on the ground floor, with steps up to a small living area, and then a double section bathroom with a jacuzzi bath! There was no door at all to this bathroom mind so that was slightly strange..! The place was huge, and all built into the caves overlooking Cappadocia’s pigeon valley.

We had to do several videos for our travel film and both our instagram stories, we were too excited to have been given such an incredible place to stay having originally booked the standard cave room. I am sure that would have been really cool too, but this blew us away.

I was very happy to have tea and coffee readily available, and we were given a small bottle of wine and a box of Turkish delight as a gift which was a lovely touch, as well as a little Covid hygiene kit with wipes and sanitiser.

Bar and roof terrace

It was a lot of stairs up to the roof terrace! There is a lower level terrace for eating as well as an indoor section too. Cappadocia gets very cold in winter, but it was toasty mid-September. The main reason we had picked Koza Cave hotel was the roof terrace, and it did not disappoint.

There were plenty of carpets and cushions and the view was spectacular. We could see across the whole of Goreme, and over to Pigeon Valley behind us. It was the perfect place to have a drink and watch the sun set.

The bar opens at 6pm every evening and the bartender is lovely and grew up in Turkey but lived in Australia for a while. He has several bespoke Koza Cave special cocktails. Sadly I only tried one, the sunset cocktail but it was floral and light and delicious!

We then got a bottle of rose to enjoy whilst we took a cheeky time-lapse of the sunset. It was a really stunning setting which we had almost all to ourselves other than a few girls on the cushions. We sat on one of the little tables nearest the sunset for the best views.

Enjoying the room

We headed out for dinner at one of our favourite places, Fat Boys, which you can read about in my main Cappadocia post. When we came back we thought it would be rude not to test out the jacuzzi bath and sample the wine that we had kindly been gifted. It was really lovely and we had such a relaxing, luxurious evening. The bed was outrageously comfortable, which wasn’t that helpful for getting up for the balloons the next morning!

Sunrise balloon watching

We dragged ourselves up at 5.45 to go an watch the balloons. The set off around 5.30, but we were the wrong side of the valley to watch them actually take off. So we got a bit of extra sleep and were pretty much the only people up there for the whole experience, no need to fight for the best space. It made the whole thing even more magical. We were able to get some amazing shots.

We don’t think there were as many balloons as the morning we did our flight, but it still looked stunning. And that cannot be helped. We did get a bonus visit from resident cat Kiki on the roof though who was happy to be in some photos too.

It was pretty chilly up there, but worth ditching the jacket for a few moments of cold for that perfect photo right? And speaking of, being so high up was pretty fun as it was great for people watching! So many girls in full on ball gowns doing lengthy photoshoots. Fair play to them but didn’t quite have the space for that in the old 55L rucksack myself!

There was actually a fake breakfast and some blankets on the roof just below ours where we could see and hear pretty much all of some girls shoot, and then just before we went down they were kicked off because it was someone else turn. Probably cheaper than paying for a hotel, but not quite the same experience…

After the balloons thinned out and we had photos we were pleased with we went back to bed for a few hours to maximise comfiness and sleep time before breakfast.

Koza Cave Hotel breakfast

I had been seriously looking forward to this breakfast. You see all the photos from the cave hotels of huge spreads and I could not wait to get stuck in. Ozgur promised us the best Turkish breakfast, and I believe they delivered. We had meats, cheeses, fried bread, eggs, pancakes, regular bread, various jams and honeys. I am hungry now just typing it let alone from the picture!

Our stay at Koza Cave hotel

We had the most fantastic stay here. It way outdid our expectations, probably thanks to our surprise upgrade, but the roof terrace and drinks and food were all really really great. The staff were lovely and really helpful, double checking our transfer times and making sure we had a great stay.

I would definitely recommend staying here if you want a night in a cave hotel. There may be cheaper out there but it truly does have the best views over Cappadocia. Plus it is a small family run business that is run sustainably, which it is good to support as a traveller. many of the hotels are much much bigger so this one has a much more personal touch. Plus it has two really fluffy cats! Best hotel ever. If you want to check out there site then click here for more info!