By Air

Pierre Eliot Trudeau International Airport (formerly Dorval Airport) is located in the west central region of the city in Dorval, about 25 minutes from downtown (the trip gets significantly longer as rush hour approaches). Mirabel International is located in the Laurentian's region, off of Highway 15 (the Laurentian Autoroute). It takes about 50 minutes from downtown without traffic delays, but the route in or out of the city is often congested, sometimes even outside rush hours. Most of the air traffic has been moved back to the Trudeau airport in Dorval. Charters may fly in and out of Mirabel, check with your carrier to determine where you touchdown.

By Train

The main train terminus, Gare Central, is located in the downtown area. The station is just south of Rene Levesque Blvd, on La Gauchetiere, between Mansfield and University. It can be accessed from the Queen Elizabeth or Bonaventure Hotels. The nearest Metro (subway) is Bonaventure which can be accessed via the underground pedestrian walkway. West bound Via trains may stop at the Dorval station, inquire with the rail line.

By Bus

The main bus terminus, Station Centrale (Telephone 514-842-2281), is located in the eastern section of the downtown core at, 505 Blvd.du Maisonneuve Blvd. East, on the corner of Berri. The terminus has direct connections into several of the Metro (Subway) lines. In turn the Metro system connects into the commuter train network as well as the national and international services, allowing you to reach most anywhere in North America.

Botanical Garden, Mont-Royal, Olympic Park, Square Saint-Louis, Rue Sherbrooke, St. Joseph's Oratory

Botanical Garden

Parc Maisonneuve (metro Pie IX), incorporates North America's leading botanical garden, the lay-out of which is wonderfully imaginative. Visitors are drawn in particular to the Japanese Garden. The glasshouses too are exceptional, especially the displays of orchids and bonsai. The gardens contain in all some 22,000 species of plant.

Mont-Royal

Mont-Royal rises 233 m (765 ft) above the city and is the green lung near the city center. A stroll through this lovely park enables the visitor to see monuments from Jacques Cartier to King George VI, to spend some time by the Lac-aux-Castors and to have a look at the cemeteries on the western slope where the city's different ethnic groups have rested in peace together for centuries. From the summit, or rather from a platform below the cross, there unfolds a magnificent panorama of the whole of the 51 km (32 mi.) length of the Île de Montréal and the St Lawrence. On clear days the view extends to the Adirondack Mountains in the USA.

Olympic Park

Montreal's Olympic Park, to the east, was the site of the 1976 Summer Olympics.

The Olympic Stadium, at its center, takes between 60,000 and 80,000 spectators and is nowadays used for baseball, festivals, fairs and shows. Looking like a great seashell, the bowl can be covered over against the elements by a roof attached by cables to the mast looming above it. A platform at the top of the mast reached by a lift affords a magnificent view, in fine weather, over the city and its surroundings.

The Olympic Stadium, one of the most visited sports arenas in North America, is the home of Montréal's famous baseball team, the "Montréal Expos".

Square Saint-Louis

Square Saint-Louis, reached by taking the metro to Sherbrooke Station, is one of Montréal's prettiest old squares, set in a turn-of-the-century French-Canadian residential quarter. In the little streets around the tree-shaded square there are still a few of the attractive Victorian houses, some of them now pleasant restaurants. Part of the Rue Saint-Denis and the pedestrian mall along the Rue Prince-Arthur at the western end of the square are given over in summer to outdoor cafés, etc., in fact all the lively street life of a modern bohemian quarter.

Rue Sherbrooke

Named after Sir John Sherbrooke, Governor General of Canada from 1816 to 1818, Rue Sherbrooke is probably the city's most elegant main shopping thoroughfare, still retaining in the downtown section something of its 19th c. charm as it cuts across the Île de Montréal from east to west. At the turn of the century the few thousand people living in this quarter on the slopes of Mont-Royal owned about 70 per cent of Canada's wealth, earning it the title of the "Golden Square Mile".

St. Joseph's Oratory

The Oratoire Saint-Joseph in Montreal, near the western exit from the park, is dedicated to Canada's patron saint, and is a mecca for pilgrims. A huge Renaissance-style domed basilica was built in 1924, at the instignation of Brother André of the Congrégation de Sainte-Croix who had already built a small chapel here in 1904, where he performed miraculous acts of healing for which he was canonized in 1982. His tomb is in one part of the sanctuary in the original chapel. Votive gifts are displayed in a second chapel. A cloister behind the church leads up to Mont-Royal. Brother André's monument is by Emile Brunnet and that for St Joseph by Alfred Laliberté. A small museum exhibits religious art. There is a good view from the observatory over north-west Montréal and Lac Saint-Louis.

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January - February -> -13(°C) - Winter
July - August -> 26(°C) - Summer

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