Cappadocia Cave Hotels

via Yunak.com

The Turkish cave hotel is my hands-down favorite boutique hotel experience. Ever. Look at the photo on the right...each room was originally a single family home in the cave house village. Now it's a furnished luxury retreat overlooking the moonscape of Cappadocia.

Yunak Evleri was even listed in The 1000 Places to See Before You Die, featured several times in Conde Nast, and countless other international magazines and newspapers.

There are other less expensive cave hotels in the towns all over Cappadocia and I recommend trying one of them instead of the giant tourist hotels on the outskirts.

Activites of the area are amazing - from the Goreme Valley Open Air Museum with UNESCO heritage site monasteries and frescoed chapels - to the hot air balloon rides, underground cities, wineries and carpet shops.

I had an entire chapter set in Goreme that got nixed from Burnt Amber, but I'm holding out for an opportunity to use the setting in another outline. It really is so bleeping inspiring.