Matt and I came back from a quick trip to Montreal yesterday, and I wanted to jot down our trip for anyone who needs recommendations in the future! We discovered the Passeport Montreal, which is a 2 or 3 day pass card for the city. It covers tons of interesting sites, museums, and activities, all while providing a transit pass valid on all metro and bus lines. We have a history of loving city passes (see our Osaka trip from 2011 for example), and jumped at the chance to experience the city this way. We were able to easily purchase the pass from an infotouriste center at Peel, and immediately began using it.
We chose to visit the following sites:
Jardin Botanique
These are a series of outside gardens and indoor greenhouses. We took a whole morning and explored the grounds, and could have done much more. The photo above is from the Japanese gardens, as we sat at a viewing pavilion. The gardens are easy to get to from the green metro line, and just a wonderful place to be.
MAC, or Musee d'Art Contemporain
A quick museum with a lot of varied exhibits. I enjoyed the installations of native art, many of which dealt with the great abuse suffered by native women: rape, murders, abductions, etc. We also found it fascinating that we went to Montreal and saw The National in their 6-hour performance of "Sorrow."
Biosphere
The Biosphere was built to house America's pavilion in the Expo '67 world's fair. We sold it to Canada for $1 after the event, and it now houses an incredible museum dedicated to the environment. It's a great place for elementary-aged children, too!
Musee des Beax-Arts Montreal
This museum was walking distance from our place near Guy Concordia metro. It has a ton of exhibits, and we walked quite a bit of it. We went through the wing dedicated to Canadian artists, which started with contemporary work by native artists and then went back in time, working up to present again down each level of the wing. We also saw some very postmodern work in another area, dealing with games in art and tricks of the mind, and then a whole exhibit on the cosmos and human place in it. We finished our day with a contemporary native artist and her look at women and children in the native cultures.
Observatoire 360 at Place Ville Marie: very hard to find from directions, but stupid easy to find actually. Walk into 1 Place Ville Marie, and head straight on the left side of the large entry room. There should be an elevator on your left, take it up as high as you can, to the ticket level. Then you'll go up a few more times to the actual open area! It was stunning, although I didn't take any pictures due to smudges on the glass. We also walked up the Mont Royal our first day in, and the view from that hill wasn't as interesting as this, and it was also full of instagrammers.
There's tons more sites, too, this is just what we chose for our two-day pass use!
And oh, the food:
Grilled cheese with apple and various confections at Cookie Stefanie, a dedicated GF facility. Truly amazing, worth several visits. It's near Notre Dame in old city.
Modavie French Bistro in old city provided a great meal as well. It's very GF friendly, with tons of options clearly labeled. The star of our night was the saffron risotto with fresh sage, Parmesan, and hazelnuts.
Arepas can't be beat! We went to Arepera, a fantastic and entirely GF restaurant. There's tons of GF eats and beer, if you want it. I actually ate empanadas for the first time in my life! It's close to Sherbrooke metro.
Matt obviously had to have a Montreal bagel, too, so we searched for a good place. We finally found Bagels on Greene, a surprising market that has tons of bagels, sandwiches, and Indian food! The Montreal bagels are not GF, obviously, but they do have GF bagels and GF bread, and tons of the Indian options are GF. This place is a quick walk from Atwater metro.
Other places that didn't get pictures: Patisserie Petit Lapin, a pastry shop. This is a bit far out, and not the greatest I've ever had - I recommend the donuts, a skip the cupcakes. We also had good pizza downtown at Pizza Il Focolaio. Also try to see Atwater Market, near Lionel-Groulx metro.
There's plenty of other GF friendly places we didn't get to: Boulangerie Baked2Go, DoughNats, Spanel Crepe... and more! Just search on Google maps for more suggestions.
We chose to visit the following sites:
Jardin Botanique
These are a series of outside gardens and indoor greenhouses. We took a whole morning and explored the grounds, and could have done much more. The photo above is from the Japanese gardens, as we sat at a viewing pavilion. The gardens are easy to get to from the green metro line, and just a wonderful place to be.
MAC, or Musee d'Art Contemporain
A quick museum with a lot of varied exhibits. I enjoyed the installations of native art, many of which dealt with the great abuse suffered by native women: rape, murders, abductions, etc. We also found it fascinating that we went to Montreal and saw The National in their 6-hour performance of "Sorrow."
Biosphere
The Biosphere was built to house America's pavilion in the Expo '67 world's fair. We sold it to Canada for $1 after the event, and it now houses an incredible museum dedicated to the environment. It's a great place for elementary-aged children, too!
Musee des Beax-Arts Montreal
This museum was walking distance from our place near Guy Concordia metro. It has a ton of exhibits, and we walked quite a bit of it. We went through the wing dedicated to Canadian artists, which started with contemporary work by native artists and then went back in time, working up to present again down each level of the wing. We also saw some very postmodern work in another area, dealing with games in art and tricks of the mind, and then a whole exhibit on the cosmos and human place in it. We finished our day with a contemporary native artist and her look at women and children in the native cultures.
Observatoire 360 at Place Ville Marie: very hard to find from directions, but stupid easy to find actually. Walk into 1 Place Ville Marie, and head straight on the left side of the large entry room. There should be an elevator on your left, take it up as high as you can, to the ticket level. Then you'll go up a few more times to the actual open area! It was stunning, although I didn't take any pictures due to smudges on the glass. We also walked up the Mont Royal our first day in, and the view from that hill wasn't as interesting as this, and it was also full of instagrammers.
There's tons more sites, too, this is just what we chose for our two-day pass use!
And oh, the food:
Grilled cheese with apple and various confections at Cookie Stefanie, a dedicated GF facility. Truly amazing, worth several visits. It's near Notre Dame in old city.
Arepas can't be beat! We went to Arepera, a fantastic and entirely GF restaurant. There's tons of GF eats and beer, if you want it. I actually ate empanadas for the first time in my life! It's close to Sherbrooke metro.
Matt obviously had to have a Montreal bagel, too, so we searched for a good place. We finally found Bagels on Greene, a surprising market that has tons of bagels, sandwiches, and Indian food! The Montreal bagels are not GF, obviously, but they do have GF bagels and GF bread, and tons of the Indian options are GF. This place is a quick walk from Atwater metro.
Other places that didn't get pictures: Patisserie Petit Lapin, a pastry shop. This is a bit far out, and not the greatest I've ever had - I recommend the donuts, a skip the cupcakes. We also had good pizza downtown at Pizza Il Focolaio. Also try to see Atwater Market, near Lionel-Groulx metro.
There's plenty of other GF friendly places we didn't get to: Boulangerie Baked2Go, DoughNats, Spanel Crepe... and more! Just search on Google maps for more suggestions.
A Flamenca dancer shines in old city.
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