Montreal Travel Guide

Montreal is Canada's second-largest city and its cultural capital, a French-speaking metropolis of 1.8 million (4.3 million in the metro area) that sits on an island in the St. Lawrence River. It is the largest French-speaking city outside Paris, and that single fact shapes everything - the cafe culture, the bakery on every corner, the tendency to linger over dinner, the street fashion, the way the city feels European in a way that Toronto and Vancouver never quite manage. The city is built around Mount Royal, a 233-metre hill in the centre of the island that gives the city its name (Mont Royal became Montreal). The downtown core is south of the mountain, a dense grid of skyscrapers, underground shopping (the RESO, 32 km of tunnels) and the Bell Centre. But the real Montreal is in its neighbourhoods: the Plateau with its spiral staircases and tree-lined streets, Mile End with its bagel shops and indie boutiques, Old Montreal with its 17th-century stone buildings and cobblestone streets, and Little Italy with its Jean-Talon Market, the best public market in Canada. Montreal's food scene is legendary - poutine (invented here), smoked meat at Schwartz's, bagels at St-Viateur and Fairmount (boiled in honey water, baked in wood-fired ovens), and a restaurant scene that produces more per-capita Michelin-recognized chefs than any Canadian city. The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal (June-July) is the largest jazz festival in the world. The Just for Laughs comedy festival (July) fills the Quartier des Spectacles. And the Montreal Canadiens are not just a hockey team - they are a civic religion. Winter is long and cold (December to March, -10C average) but the city embraces it: the Underground City keeps downtown functional, the Fête des Neiges snow festival fills Parc Jean-Drapeau, and the French cafe culture means there's always a warm place to sit.