Gluten Free Dining on Princess Cruises

Ok friends, I try not to write too much about GF dining on here anymore, but I do occasionally. There is an app, Find Me Gluten Free that I highly recommend & post regularly on there, especially when we travel. It is so helpful to help find safe places to eat, review a menu before we go & see pictures. I keep saying they should hire me because I love it so much!

However, since this was our first cruise since our family has gone gluten free, I thought I would write a blog about it because I didn't find too much information before we went. 

Let me start by saying, that I was pleasantly surprised at how accommodating they were! I don't think Sadie or I felt restricted at all during the entire trip. Let me start with the buffet. We didn't eat here much, except for breakfast. We never got up early enough to eat in the main dining room, so we ate breakfast here every day. Every single item did have a little sign that noted what the item was & what allergens were present. They also had a GF bread area that always had miscellaneous bread options & the same thing for dessert. However, I went to the omelet station every morning & had fresh eggs made:

They also had a french toast, pancake & waffle station where we could request gf pancakes & waffles at any time. We both got one or the other every day & enjoyed every bite:

For lunch & dinner, they had a pizza stand where anyone could walk up & get a slice anytime. When we asked about pizza for us, they said they had gf personal pan pizzas in the back they could make for us at any time, it just took about 10 minutes. I believe they had cheese & pepperoni:

On the other side, they had a burger stand. They did have gf buns so we could have a burger or BBQ sandwich anytime. They also had a dedicated fryer that was used for french fries only so we could have fries any time, which Sadie loved:

Of course, we got the girls the drink package so they had soda anytime they wanted, but they could also safely have virgin daiquiris anytime because they were also gf. Sadie even went to a mocktail class at the kids' club & she safely made her own drink as well:

For dessert they had Swirls, the ice cream shop which had soft serve vanilla & chocolate ice cream which was safe to eat. I don't believe they had a gf cone, but I know Sadie had a lot of cups of ice cream with various toppings. I personally do not like soft serve, so I went to the gelato shop upstairs & ordered the fluffer nutter, which was worth every bite!

But where I was the most surprised was the dining room, where we ate every night for dinner. They would give us the menu for the next night every night & we would pre-order our meal for the next day. And you know what? There wasn't much we couldn't have! As long as we ordered ahead of time, they could make almost anything we asked for. I took lots of pictures because it was so good. For appetizers I had brie, a chilled strawberry smoothie, a watermelon salad, a caesar salad & even fried calamari:

For dinner, I mostly ordered pasta or beef. Ha! That pretty much sums up my life since I don't really like seafood. My absolute favorite meal of the week was their fettuccini alfredo. They had to sub the pasta for gf spaghetti, but the sauce was delicious!

Same for the spaghetti carbonara:

and the risotto:

They even impressed me with their chicken parmigiana:

For beef dishes I had the beef tenderloin, beef wellington & bacon wrapped meatloaf:

Dessert was the only item we never ordered. The chef surprised us & sent out a new dessert every single night. Some I don't know what it was, but it tasted good?! But my favorite was the baked Alaska:

I am actually lactose intolerant also, so I try to eat dairy free most of the time & at home, that is very easy. Eating out is another story because not only is it harder, but I also want it! On occasions like this, I take a lactose pill when I wanted to indulge in something, however, I still limit my dairy as much as possible, even if I take the pill. For instance, when I would order one of the creamy pasta dishes, I would order the vegan ice cream to end the night. Instead of having regular ice cream, I would have the dairy free to ease my stomach. They had chocolate & vanilla & I thought they were delicious! So, I am not ashamed that I would order a scoop every single night, even though the chef sent a dessert out too:

So that's it! Like I said, we ate like queens on the ship & I never once felt restricted. In fact, I probably I gained about 5 pounds because I enjoyed eating so much! But that's what a cruise is for, right?! Thank you Princess for being so welcoming & accommodating for those with food allergies. I hope other cruisers read this & have as good of an experience as we did!

Regal Princess Cruise - Shore Excursions

 Our first stop on the cruise was in Cozumel, Mexico & it was perfect weather! The girls & I got off early so we could walk around the port & shop:

It was fun walking around because just like the ship, everything was decorated for Christmas:

Eventually the rest of our family got off & met up with us for our excursion:

We all took a bus to Chankanaab where we got to swim with the dolphins!

Unfortunately, they would not let us take pictures & their pictures were $30 each so we have zero pictures from our outing. But we had the BEST time in the water! We spent about 1 1/2 hours in the water all getting to dance, kiss & swim the dolphins. It seriously was so much fun & I was so proud of everyone for doing it. Afterwards, we had free time, so we had lunch & the kids got to play on the beach & swim:

On Wednesday, we were still in Mexico but at a different port. This time we were in:

Unfortunately, it was pretty cloudy when we walked off the boat, but the rain held off for a little bit:

Granny stayed on the boat this day but the rest of us headed to:

It was a water park with zip lining also. It actually was a big pyramid in the middle where all of the water slides were & the zip line started. Since it wasn't raining, we started with the zip line first which worked perfectly because there were no lines & we were able to finish before the rain moved in:

We have zip lined several times before, but this one was a lot of fun for something different! They had walking bridges between towers, a zip roller coaster & the last zip ended in the pool so thank goodness we had our bathing suits on! As soon as we finished, it started raining & I was cold, so I didn't really swim or do the water slides, but everyone else did. Instead, I walked around & took pictures:

This is how it pretty much went - Sophie started with Bryan & Whitney while the 3 older kids were off doing their own thing. But eventually when it started really raining, Sophie got scared because of the storm so she stayed inside the pyramid with me, Penny & Robert so Bryan spent the day with Whitney while the rest of us hunkered inside:

It really was a cool waterpark & if we are ever in this part of Mexico again, I would totally go back. There was so much more I would have done if it wasn't raining so hard or if I wasn't so cold!

Some of the group stayed on land & shopped some more but our family of 4 got back on the boat because this was the day the Longhorns were playing so we wanted to watch the game. I took this picture from our balcony later that afternoon because I was shocked how close all of our ships were to each other. We were literally talking to passengers on the other cruise boat on the balconies across from us:

Our final stop on Thursday was in Roatan, Honduras & we were most excited for this stop because our family had not been here before. And you know what, I could tell right away I was going to like it because it was a beautiful, lush, mountainous island much prettier than Mexico in my opinion. It was partly cloudy, but we ran off the ship as soon as we could because we were excited to explore:

Bryan & Sadie really wanted to dive but they only had 10 dive spots open on the cruise's itinerary & we didn't sign up fast enough. When we got off, we walked around the port, found a driver who took us to the other side of the island on West Bay/West End. Bryan knew this was where more of the touristy part of the island where everyone stayed & where all of the water activities happened. We found a local dive shop that was able to charter us a private boat for the 2 of them to dive & for me & Sophie to snorkel:

Like I said, it never rained, but it was definitely partly cloudy. They dove for about 50 minutes & we snorkeled with them for about 30 minutes. The 2 of us floated around on top of the water following them while they dove out in the open water. We were so excited & saw a sting ray as soon as we jumped in, but honestly, after that, we didn't see much. It didn't help that since we were on top of the water & it was cloudy, it was foggier in the water. The 2 of them had a great time & saw so much down below. In fact, Sadie said this was one of her favorite dives ever! I can't remember what all they saw but I know for sure they saw a sea turtle & a shark. Plus, they swam into a cave/tunnel, which was a first for both of them:

I wasn't too bummed we didn't see much because I just love going sailing & being out on the water. By the time we drove back to the other side of the island where we docked, the sun was finally starting to come out. There was a beach that was for the cruise guests which was surprisingly very nice! 

The rest of our family had spent time here & we enjoyed walking around & checking it all out, but, I'm still glad we had the chance to go out on the water. This port also had a great area for shopping, so we did pick up a few things while we were here before heading back on board:

And that was it - 4 days at sea & 3 days on shore. We had a great time on the cruise & with our shore excursions, but my personal favorite was getting to experience a new island since we had never been there before. Thanks again Robert & Sherry for such a wonderful trip! Cheers to the new year & to your 50th anniversary!