After visiting Quebec’s second largest city Quebec City the day before, the next stop on our road trip was the province’s largest city Montreal. We spent two days here touring Old Montreal, the Olympic Park vicinity, and Plateau Mont-Royal neighborhood, eating our fill of sesame bagels along the way. Since there’s too much to fit in a single post, I’ll start with one of the most photogenic places we visited, Montreal Botanical Garden.

We entered at the garden’s “north” end, stepping foot into the expansive Arboretum covering over half of the garden’s total area. The equivalent of 59 football fields!

From this northernmost end, thanks to the cloudy day, we embarked on a very pleasant stroll towards the lower end of the park, where we first came across the First Nations Garden and then the Japanese Garden.

A little further along was the Chinese Garden.

Reunited with our cousin after 9 years!

Eventually we reached the Exhibition Greenhouses near the main entrance on the completely opposite end of the park. Here we were dazzled by the prickly, the spotted, the swirly, the braided, and the miniature.

On our walk back to the end of the park where we entered, our eyes feasted on flowers galore in the Perennial Garden,

assorted “useful plants” (code for edible ones) in the Economic Plant Garden,

and plenty more flowers in the Garden of Innovations!

All in all, it was a visit diverse in rich colors, funky shapes, fresh air, and natural beauty.