How to trek the Tour du Mont Blanc if you’re Gluten Free

Last Updated on January 21, 2026 by tourdumontblanchike

Are you gluten free and want to trek the Tour du Mont Blanc? Do you have celiac disease and are wondering if it’s possible for you to trek the Tour du Mont Blanc safely?

Navigating coeliac on the TMB is no easy feat but it is possible. This post is aimed to give you as much up to date information on hiking the Tour du Mont Blanc gluten free. After being contacted by several clients, I thought it would benefit many others to do some research and delve into which Tour du Mont Blanc refuges are the best for gluten free and which to avoid.

Even a few years ago a gluten free Tour du Mont Blanc was extremely tough. Those with celiac disease or a gluten intolerance would need to always carry food with them – in fact camping and cooking yourself was safer full stop.

Nowadays the owners of refuges along the Tour du Mont Blanc trail are slowly waking up to serious dietary requirements and most do their best to accommodate, some excelling and others making do.

Of course ‘doing their best’ doesn’t cut it when you have celiac disease so planning ahead is key.

Overall, being gluten free ‘worked’ but I did try to plan ahead stocking up on food I could eat for lunch each time we went past a grocery store. Most of my calories definitely came from dairy. I think you’d really struggle if you were vegan or lactose intolerant in the refuges we attended. Robin Quirt

Expect breakfasts to be the trickiest gluten free meal on the Tour du Mont Blanc. Le petit-déjeuner in a high mountain refuge can be frugally basic – bread and jam…

For these huts it pays to cart along some gluten free bread or crackers in your backpack. In lower refuges and valley hotel breakfasts will generally have a greater variety, many being buffet style so you can expect yogurts, fruit, eggs and potentially gluten free bread and cereal. Of course buffet style also brings risks for those with gluten intolerance from cross contamination- I’ll talk about that later in the post.

In these lower refuges and valley hotels you will also have the added advantage of your TMB luggage transfer being able to reach you – so you’ll be able to stock up with your stashed gluten free snacks and provisions which is helpful if your next overnight refuge is a more remote one.

It’s essential to learn a few words of the local language to guarantee you can clearly convey the important fact that you are gluten free. Of course most refuge owners and staff do speak English on the Tour du Mont Blanc but its not a given, so learn how to say you are gluten free.

Gluten free in Italian is “senza glutine”

Gluten free in French is “sans gluten”

Note: the area of Switzerland where you will trekking on the Tour du Mont Blanc is French speaking so you will not need to know any German.

In general out of the three countries you’ll be trekking through whilst you’re on the Tour du Mont Blanc, Italy seems to be the most aware of celiac disease, however gluten free sections can be found in supermarkets in all three countries.

In general, we were pleasantly surprised about the level of awareness at the TMB refuges and the willingness to cater for our kids’ dietary needs.  We felt we had a great experience overall.  Coeliac is very difficult as so many products have wheat in them or can be cross-contaminated from shared utensils etc.  Also, bread is commonly served with everything. Fortunately our kids are very flexible and generally happy to eat whatever will be safe for them.  They rarely missed out on this trip.  I think it was helpful that many of the refuges use simple whole ingredients in their meals, so they know exactly what is in the food.  This is much better and safer than using highly processed foods which commonly have wheat as a thickener or additive. Ruth Eagles

Did you know you can order a bag transfer around the Tour du Mont Blanc? This is gold for gluten intolerant trekkers. Bring your favourite gluten free snacks from home and shop for gluten free bread or crackers locally in Chamonix before the off packing it all up in your bag for transferring along the route.

Bag transfer services cannot reach every refuge on the Tour du Mont Blanc, but they do serve many of them. You’ll only be separated from your bag during occasional stays at high mountain refuges that are inaccessible by road (such as but not limited to Des Prés, Le Balme, Elisabetta, Bertone, Bonatti, and Lac Blanc). On a typical TMB itinerary, you’re likely to stay in just two or three of these refuges; the rest of the time, you’ll be in lower-altitude refuges or valley accommodations that are accessible by road and serviced by bag transfer companies.

I’ve written a post all about bag transfers along the Tour du Mont Blanc. You can read it here. TMB bag transfers are fairly expensive so it’s best to share if you can with another person. The cost depends on how many stops your bag has along the route but you should expect it to be around €160-170 each if you are sharing one bag.

Neither of the kids had symptoms of gluten exposure at any time in the trip, which is a good sign.  One in particular will feel quite dreadful if she has accidental gluten exposure so it’s good that it didn’t happen out hiking. Ruth Eagles

I interviewed two groups that trekked the Tour du Mont Blanc in 2025 in order to write this post. With different itineraries they managed to span 13 key refuges, with a cross over on only three refuges that they both stayed at (Alpage de la Peule, Cabane Combal & Gite Alpage Ecuries de Charmillion)

A big thank you to Robin Quirty and Ruth & Sophie Eagles for providing such detailed on their gluten free Tour du Mont Blanc.

Ruth explains how she prepared for their gluten free Tour du Mont Blanc experience & how it turned out in reality.

I emailed all the refuges before we booked (actually, before the bookings opened for the season) just to ask if they would be equipped for gluten free meals.  Then when I made the booking, I put a note with the booking to say we had 2 x gluten free (coeliac) in the group.  I emailed again a friendly reminder a few days before arrival and then notified at check in.  So, for most of the refuges that was 2 x emails and 1 x notification at check-in.  For some of the refuges there was a clear system and one email would have been enough, as they told me they were already aware and prepared following the first email, but for others we actually needed to remind them when dinner arrived at the table.  I think the key here is to be relaxed and flexible as for all of them we got there in the end.

For the kids with coeliac, we carried our own lunches and did not rely on the refuges.  We bought gluten free bread, crackers etc in Chamonix and Courmayeur, and supplemented these with cheese, fruit, nuts, chocolate etc which were easy to find.

We carried some gluten free freeze-dried hiking meals (bought in Chamonix) just in case nothing else was available, but actually never needed them.

I carried “restaurant cards” in French and Italian, explaining about coeliac disease and what is fine to eat and what is not.  This was helpful at one of the refuges when someone wasn’t sure and I showed them the card.  It was reassuring to be carrying them.

There were good gluten-free sections in the supermarkets in Chamonix, and in the larger supermarket in Courmayeur (not the small one though), which had non-perishable items like GF crackers and bread substitutes.  The supermarket in Courmayeur was particularly well labelled including clear labelling on the lollies!  The small supermarket in La Fouly had a small but good GF section as well.  There was less at the supermarket in Champex Lac, but we found what we needed.

All of the refuges had bread at the table, which of course was wheat bread and contained gluten.  I think if you want to have GF bread at the table it would be best to just bring your own as it would be unrealistic to expect high mountain huts to provide GF bread as well.

*Another tip I have is to be prepared to read food labels in multiple languages to check for allergens.  This was important for things like ice cream and chocolate.  When shopping at the supermarkets in Italy and Switzerland, some of the labels were in French, German, Italian but not English.  Fortunately my son speaks some French and my German is good enough to identify food allergens on a label.  If I had my time again, I would download Google Translate off-line for the relevant languages to make this process easier.  

Gite Les Melezes: Dinner: starter = vegetable salad (delicious); dinner = rice, chicken mushrooms cream, peas dessert = blueberry tart (not gluten free so didn’t eat it) No alternatives to bread offered. Only GF breakfast option was melon & yogurt. Everything else was gluten-full but yogurt with jam was very yummy.

Alberge du Truc: Soup and omelette were gluten free.  They made separate GF pasta for the kids.  The dessert was gluten free anyway.  For breakfast, GF crackers were provided instead of bread.  The kids particularly enjoyed the hot chocolate made with fresh milk straight from the cow.  We liked this refuge in general and found it to be friendly, helpful and excellent value overall.

Refuge des Pres: Great food in general.  The soup was GF (we had 2 servings) and the salad was probably fine too but we forgot to ask about the dressing so the kids didn’t have any.  They made the kids a dish with lentils and bacon, which they loved and said was excellent, while the rest of us had something different.  The dessert wasn’t quite as good but they provided the kids with a fruit dish while the rest of us had cake.  Gluten free bread was provided for the kids for breakfast.

Refuge de la Croix du Bonhomme: Food: did accommodate gluten free dinner. Lentil green bean soup. Rice and tomato vegetable stew. Everyone else had a baked pasta dish. No dessert that was GF. There was bread but no GF alternative. No breakfast that was GF

Refuge de la Nova (Les Chapieux): Dinner was gluten free anyway – soup, with sausages and rice.  The dinner wasn’t so good for anyone (though perhaps we are too discerning about having nicely cooked rice).  Dessert was gluten free for everyone and was excellent.  They did not provide the kids with anything GF for breakfast and what was available did not have sufficient naturally GF options, so we had to bring out the food we were carrying.  In general, this was the worst food experience we had, mostly because of the rice and the lack of breakfast.

Cabane Combal: Excellent experience here.  The kids got separate GF pasta for starters, then the meal and dessert was naturally GF main pork loin with mashed potato, pano cotta dessert. , then the dessert was naturally GF and excellent.  The kids got GF baked goods for breakfast which were also good.  Overall this refuge seemed to have a high level of awareness and great friendly service. Breakfast: cheese, ham, hard boiled eggs and a gluten free muffin. Also yogurt. Best breakfast options to date

Courmayeur: We found excellent gluten free pizza for lunch, right near the main tourist bus area.  We self-catered dinner from the supermarket where there were good options.  We also found good GF ice-cream and the staff were helpful and aware of coeliac.

Rifugio Bertone: Dinner: Really good soup (everyone else had pasta), beans with sausages in tomato sauce, apple for dessert (everyone else has chocolate) Breakfast rice Crakers with jam & butter. Everyone else had bread.

Rifugio Bonatti: The vegetarian option was GF.  It was fine but there was quite a long wait for the food.  Breakfast had a good variety of options including GF cereals. 

Alpage de la Peule: The staff had less awareness here, but after some discussion they were very helpful and provided the kids with delicious and large omelettes which hit the spot.  Salad and dessert were gluten free, and they had crackers for the kids for their breakfast which was fine. Dinner: salad & an omlette. Ice cream with bananas. It was good. Breakfast: cheese bread cereal and yogurt. I could only have yogurt.

Note: a different experience here both our two groups. One being provided with GF crackers for breakfast & the other not.

Champex Lac:  We self-catered here.  The supermarket did not have a lot of bread type options but there was GF pasta so we managed fine.

Relais d’Arpette: Dinner: chili with rice & salad. Same for everyone. Breakfast: gluten free cereal, yogurt, nut & dried fruit

Refuge Peuty: This refuge needed reminding about the meals at the table, but did provide GF options for the kids which were similar to what the rest of the group was having, just without the gluten containing components (for example, soup without croutons, dessert without biscuit).

Gite Les Ecuries: The dinner was gluten free anyway and had a good dessert.  The breakfast options were sufficient with some GF options provided. Dinner: split pea soup with rice cakes, chicken & rice. Cheese & pannacota. Breakfast: rice cakes, fromage blanc, jam

Refuge Lac Blanc:  This refuge was able to cater but they asked us to bring gluten free bread with us (which we did).  This was important for breakfast.  Most of the dinner was naturally gluten free anyway, but dessert was cake (which was not gluten free) and they just had a piece of fruit for the kids.  Fortunately we were carrying plenty of spare GF dessert food. Dinner: lentils, sausage, cheese, apricots. Breakfast: nothing. Only bread & jam available. 

The clear winner in the Tour du Mont Blanc refuges that were visited is CABANE COMBAL! With gluten free pasta for starters and a naturally GF dinner and dessert. Coupled with the best gluten free breakfast on the Tour du Mont Blanc – cheese, ham, hard boiled eggs and a gluten free muffin! Cabane Combal have a high level of awareness and great friendly service.

Holding joint second place is Relais d’Arpette (45 minutes outside Champex Lac on the Fenetre d’Arpette variant) and Rifugio Bonatti. Both supplied gluten free cereal along with yogurt, nut & dried fruit.

Highly commended are Auberge du Truc, Refuge Des Pres and Refuge Le Peuty

I’d also like to mention Hotel Lavachey (alternative to Bonatti) which from my experience provides the best breakfast on the whole of the Tour du Mont Blanc. Eggs, yogurt, cheeses and hams are provided. I have not stayed there recently with a view to researching GF so I can’t say what substitutes for bread they would provide but its a great option if you can’t get into Bonatti (but book well ahead with Luca!).

Have you trekked the Tour du Mont Blanc gluten free? If you have anything to add to this article please do comment below.