In June of 2025, after a fun decision-making process, my sister Beth and I traveled to Montreal. The decision-making process involved each of us listing 10 locales, trading the lists, then each of us picking three from the other person’s list. To be honest, I liked Beth’s list better, but in the end we chose Montreal from my list. It was a fantastic trip!
To start, we were able to book first class flights at a super cheap rate. They were smaller planes, but it was still nice to have comfier seats and free drinks! More on this later.
After checking out a multitude of hotel options, we landed on the Sonder Apollon Apartments in Old Montreal. It’s not your typical hotel. Our initial room was a two bedroom, almost 800 square foot apartment. Due to construction noise and smelling the construction machinery, we were moved to two one bedroom apartments close to each other. These were also lovely and were almost 700 square feet each. The apartments came with laundry, a mini-kitchen and a lot of storage space. They were beautifully furnished and the pricing was very reasonable.
We filled our long weekend with many fun activities! We saw two wonderful shows in Montreal churches. The first was a light show in the Basilica of Notre Dame. This was a beautiful way to showcase a gorgeous church. And, fun fact, after the show while waiting in line for the bathroom, Beth was blessed with a bird pooping on her head! Ha ha!
We also saw a string quartet perform Adele by Candlelight at the Église Saint Jean-Baptiste. It was a lovely setting to soak in the magic of Adele. Both of these shows were booked through Fever Montreal. Video is below.
On another evening we went on a Haunted Old Montreal Ghost Tour. We walked through Old Montreal listening to our guide tell spooky tales from the past.
We tapped our adventurous sides and rode La Grande Roue de Montreal. It gave great views of the city!
And finally, we ate! We went on a walking food tour through Spade and Palacio tours. They bill themselves as non-tourist tours, and they truly are unique. It was wonderful! Our group was very small, about eight people. We traversed the area around the Marche Jean Talon in Little Italy and then toured the market itself. Jean Talon is one of the largest open air markets in North America. We sampled pupusas, cannoli, smoked salmon, cheese, salami, gelato, coffee, the most delicious strawberries and more. The pistachio butter and strawberries were my fave. I’m not really a fruit person but the strawberries were next level.
We lucked out in choosing several yummy restaurants. We had huge portions at Mediterranean style Tzatzi-Qui and I had a mind blowing chicken liver parfait with potted butter, pickled cranberries, apple and raisin compote and toast at L’Orignal. We had pastries and dumplings in Chinatown.
Of course, we had to try several Montreal specialties including “Beaver Tails” (very similar to an elephant ear for us fair-going Americans), poutine, and Schwartz’s smoked meat (dare I say it gives Katz’s a run for their money). All were delicious.
After an unforgettable time, our return trip took an interesting turn involving several flight cancellations and an unexpected hotel stay. But…..we got to turn left on a 30 minute flight to Toronto and sit in the special seats. We wished it was a 6 hour flight instead of 30 minutes!
I can’t wait for our next adventure!
