We started to hike from Uçhisar Castle at 6am and it was totally worth it. We did it in the opposite direction recommended by All Trails. Barely anyone on the trail, beautiful colours in White Valley and no one in Love Valley, so perfect for pictures. For the 5km connection Göreme to Uçhisar, a dog accompanied us and led the way on the trail. Wear good shoes and be prepared for the some good climbs (we climbed 430m and walked almost 14km). Very little signage on the trail, but the All Trails map worked fine! FYI, the hot ballons were cancelled so we did not see them and we were not bothered by the jeeps with tourists, but I can see that on days where there are hot ballons, it can get busy on the shared road.
A beautiful hike with magnificent views of Uçhisar castle, two beautiful painted churches (one of which is very difficult to access) and a passage through a green gorge. With the app and downloaded itinerary, no particular difficulty. The route is counter-clockwise, so you don't have to pay for access to the Göreme viewpoint on arrival ;-)
Great walk, we went off to look at lots of the caves, take plenty of water and download the route before you go. I’ve included where the route goes off the map due to rock fall and danger signs, easy to follow up the gorge tho. Totally go clockwise, the rope up the cliff is absolutely one way I’d hate to try to scrabbled down ! No dogs, 2 locals selling drinks, nuts, honey etc. on the route. We took 4ltrs of water between the 3 of us and lunch. All told it took us 5 hours, but totally worth all the side trips. We walked from Göreme down the main road and came back via some countryside to see the candles of love valley. Wear grippy shoes, trainers or boots there’s lots of sliding in the ash (dust) and don’t wear black like me, you’ll come back grey! Lol