Montreal Travel: A Great Mid-Summer Getaway

Montreal  is always an amazing getaway destination from Toronto – in a bit more than 5 hours you can reach a vibrant destination that distinguishes itself with a special European flair. The city is equally close to the eastern seaboard and easily accessible within a few hours from places such as Boston, New York City or Philadelphia. This easy access combined with Montreal’s vibrant unique cultural scene make it a popular summer escape.

We had planned our Montreal getaway for some special reasons: being the avid tennis fans that we are, we decided to catch some top level tennis at the Rogers Cup in Montreal. Every year, Toronto and Montreal host the biggest male and female tennis stars at their respective tennis stadiums. This year, the men’s elite players were playing in Montreal while the female players were competing in Toronto. We had booked tickets for August 10 and 11, 2011 and were excited to see a line-up of the world’s best tennis players in one of our favourite cities: Montreal.

So on a Wednesday morning we headed off early at 6 am and managed to avoid the rush hour traffic that normally snarls the morning drive in Toronto. By about 11:30 am, after a short traffic slowdown at the intersection of highways 40 and 15 in Montreal, we had reached our destination: Uniprix Stadium at Jarry Park, location of the Rogers Cup 2011.

Right away we got treated to an amazing match: the world’s former number 1 Roger Federer was set to play against young Canadian Vasek Pospisil. The crowd was solidly behind the Canadian who put in a respectable performance. The excitement continued with the conclusion of a match between John Isner and Marcos Baghdatis, followed up by a sometimes tense battle beween Novak Djokovic and Nikolai Davydenko. We had a brief look at the Del Potro – Cilic match before the sky clouded over and released its fury in a powerful thunderstorm. All the tennis watchers were huddled underneath the stadium’s overhangs and in the retail tents that were set up around the area. The dark clouds overhead released their heavy wet load with amazing intensity.

Then it was time to get to our accommodation for the night. Always on the lookout for unconventional travel ideas, I had recently come across a website called www.airbnb.com which actually connects travellers with locals who are renting rooms or apartments. Airbnb offers a wide range of accommodations, from simple pullout couches in someone’s living room for maybe $20 a night to high end condos and loft spaces for $250 a night and more.

Since we were on a tight budget I ended up booking a queen size bedroom in a two-bedroom apartment for $50 a night. We were located literally across the street from the Lionel Groulx metro station and just minutes from the Marché Atwater. Airbnb added a booking fee of about $6 to each night, so the accommodation came to $56 a night, which was not a bad deal at all. The location was fantastic, and the apartment itself, although not fancy, had everything we needed.

We had a fully equipped kitchen at our disposal and met our other flat-sharing travellers: a nice young couple from Toronto who were in Montreal for a week. The reduced lack of privacy was not a major deterrent, although locks on the bedroom door would have helped since we had a high-end video camera and a laptop computer that we would have liked to safely store. Fortunately the other travel guests in the apartment were respectful and honest, but a place to lock our valuables would definitely have been helpful.

Day 2 of our Montreal tennis excursion was equally exciting. We started with a morning  stroll through the Jean Talon Market, a huge farmers’ market in Montreal’s Little Italy. About 300 vendors, mostly local farmers from the area surrounding Montreal, display their wares in this popular marketplace. Then we followed up with a nice greasy breakfast at Deli Joe before we entered Uniprix Stadium for another day of great tennis. From the Murray brothers in doubles, to Berdych and Karlovic, to Wawrinka and Anderson, Tipsarevic and Dodig and Fish versus Gulbis, we enjoyed another world-class selection of tennis matches.  After crashing for a few hours back at our apartment we went for a walk on Atwater Street before heading for a nice dinner to Guido and Angelina’s, a stylish Italian restaurant at the intersection of Atwater and St. Catharine streets.

Our third day in Montreal was dedicated to exploring the city. It started with breakfast in the historic Marché Atwater, Montreal’s other big farmers market, located just minutes down the street from our apartment. I enjoyed a nice breakfast at the Première Moisson Bakery after admiring dozens of stands with colourful home-grown fruits and vegetables, meat and cheese products, honey and preserves and many other local artisanal products. Built in 1933, the market building itself is one of Montreal’s Art Deco landmarks.

Then I walked further south to catch a glimpse of the Lachine Canal, formerly an important waterway that was opened in 1825 to avoid the treacherous Lachine Rapids. Although the canal became obsolete in the second half of the 20^th century due to the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway, it has successfully been transformed into a recreational area with extensive bicycle paths and parklands. Many of the old industrial buildings in the area have been converted into loft condos and the entire Atwater Market area has become one of Montreal’s most popular residential areas.

Then we hopped on the metro and minutes later we exited at the Sherbrooke metro station and walked up vibrant Saint Denis Street with its many restaurants and bistros. St-Denis runs through two of Montreal’s most popular entertainment districts: the Latin Quarter and the Plateau Mont Royal.

At Duluth Street we turned into a residential area. Montreal’s residential neighbourhoods offer many interesting photo opportunities with their leafy streets, whimsical building styles and unique outside staircases. Our destination was the Parc Lafontaine which has 14 public tennis courts. To work off all the calories accumulated over two days of watching tennis at the Rogers Cup, we needed to play some tennis ourselves.

After a solid two hours of tennis, we took a bit of a rest on a park bench and were approached by a couple of assertive squirrels that insisted on demanding some food from us even though our hands were empty. This park is a wonderful oasis in the middle of the city, with its leafy green walkways, picturesque ponds and sports facilities. People were having fun playing tennis, beach volleyball,  and bocce balls.

Then we walked south to Sherbrooke Street where we admired the unique and fanciful architecture of Montreal. Sherbrooke Street is one of the longest streets on the island of Montreal and features several landmarks: McGill University, the Concordia University Loyola Campus, a campus of Dawson College, the Ritz-Carlton Montreal, and further east, the Olympic Stadium as well as the Montreal Biodome and the Montreal Botanical Garden.

Strolling past McGill University we started to enter the downtown area with its shiny skyscrapers and continued our walk on busy St. Catherine Street, Montreal’s most important commercial artery.  We made a quick foray on to Crescent Street, a hugely popular entertainment district with tons of restaurants, bars, lounges, boutiques and galleries. Then we settled in for a filling dinner at Trattoria di Mikes and watched some more Rogers Cup tennis matches on the big screen.

August 13, 2011 was our departure day. We had planned to leave in the mid-afternoon which would give us a few more hours of exploring on this gorgeous day. We decided to use the last few hours of our 3-day metro pass and took the subway a few stops east to Place d’Armes. After leaving our car parked for 3.5 days, we had fallen in love with the speed and efficiency of the Montreal public transit system. Montreal’s rubber-wheeled subway (or as they called it – the “metro”) whisked us around quickly and efficiently to any destinations in the downtown area.

Place d’Armes is the second oldest public site in Montreal and was first developed in 1693. The area around the Maisonneuve Monument  was under construction while  the morning light was flooding in behind Notre-Dame Basilica, Old Montreal’s dramatic cathedral. This basilica has witnessed some important historic events: Pope John Paul II visited it in 1982, two important funerals were held here in 2000: one for Maurice “Rocket” Richard (a former Montreal Canadiens hockey superstar), and one for former prime minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau. Even Celine Dion got married at this very church in 1994.

We headed north on Rue Saint Antoine to arrive at Old Montreal’s Place Jacques Cartier which was stretching out invitingly in the warm morning sun. The roof of Montreal’s City Hall was gleaming with brown copper – I was surprised to see that the old verdigris-green roof was gone.

On my little morning photo safari I covered some of the perennial favourites of Old Montreal: Rue de la Commune on the waterfront, the Bonsecours Market whose silver dome was gleaming in the sun, and the stunning  Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel which dates back all the way to 1771.

Then I took a side street up to the Chateau Ramezay which is a historic governor’s mansion dating back to the early 1700s that has been turned into a museum. The garden behind the Chateau Ramezay is accessible free of charge and offers a serene green space in the middle of Vieux Montreal.  I also snapped some pictures of the fountain beside city hall as well as of the view of downtown Montreal and Chinatown from the Champs de Mars area, whose archeological remains show evidence of Montreal’s fortifications.

Then we had a late breakfast on the Place Jacques Cartier which included a typical Quebec culinary specialty: poutine. (This combination of French fries, brown gravy and cheese curds is neither the healthiest nor the leanest dietary choice, but it’s simply delicious….) Finally I snapped some photos of the narrow Rue des Artistes, which was packed with artists displaying their paintings and shoppers browsing for unique pieces of art. I headed a bit further on Rue St. Paul which is a fully pedestrianized street during the summer months. It was great to see people walking in the middle of this cobble-stoned street.

Just before we made our way back to the subway to start our journey back to Toronto we admired some of the street performers and musicians on lively Place Jacques Cartier. From historic sights and architecture to great food, music, sports events and festivals – there is always something going on in Montreal…

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