We started our day with a fruit fest breakfast at the Airbnb as we realized the excessive amount of fruit we bought the previous day.

We took the metro straight to Downtown for our first stop: The Barbie Expo.

Ariela was very excited about the “underground train” which she first rode in Toronto.

This expo is free admission and is inside a shopping center.

While small, it is entertaining, and you can see a large collection of pretty unique and elaborate Barbies like the Bob Mackie ones.

We walked along St Catherine St, which is filled with nice and fancy boutiques, cafes, and restaurants. The rest of Downtown and Villa Marie area is basically just corporate buildings.

We walked a little bit north to visit McGill University campus. No real reason we wanted to see it, but it is sometimes nice to walk along a campus and see stressed out students running to class while being hangover.

We continued our downtown visit walking by the Museum of Art and other nice buildings until Ariela found a fancy food court while running around.

We decided to stay and eat there. Very expensive fast food, but really good, and the people watching was phenomenal. Eitan got a Mediterranean dish with Falafel and Sarah a build your own bowl.

We walked south to Old Montreal.

We stopped for a beer and wine at one of the brasseries (Informal restaurant) along the way while Ariela was napping in her stroller.

After the drink, we crossed through Chinatown on the way to Old Montreal.

We finally arrived in Old Montreal. This area is beautiful and looks like you are in France. Our first stop was another Princess castle, also known as the Notre-Dame Basilica of Saint Rapunzel (just kidding).

The interior of the church is amongst the most dramatic in the world and regarded as a masterpiece of Gothic Revival architecture. The vaults are colored deep blue and decorated with golden stars, and the rest of the sanctuary is decorated in blues, azures, reds, purples, silver, and gold.

It is filled with hundreds of intricate wooden carvings and several religious statues. Unusual for a church, the stained-glass windows along the walls of the sanctuary do not depict biblical scenes, but rather scenes from the religious history of Montreal.

It also has a Casavant Frères pipe organ, dated 1891, which comprises four keyboards, 92 stops using electromagnetic action and an adjustable combination system, 7000 individual pipes and a pedal board.

Approximately 11 million people visit Notre-Dame Basilica every year, making it one of the most visited monuments in North America. In 2023, Notre-Dame was named the 6th most beautiful building in the world by Angi, a home service publication which analyzes TripAdvisor reviews. The publication ranked Notre-Dame de Paris second and Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia first.

Ariela wanted a snack, so Sarah took Ariela out while Eitan continued reading about the cathedral.

We walked around without any real destination to kill time as Eitan had a job interview at 5:00 pm. We stopped for a quick coffee in a very nice coffee shop and then got separated for 30 min while Eitan took the call in a quiet place.

We found a super cool rubber duck store with many historic ducks like Marilyn Monduck and Duck Vader.

We walked around Saint Paul St which is the main street with touristy shops.

Saint Paul is Montreal’s oldest street and for many years served as its main thoroughfare. Paved in 1672, it was named after Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve, founder of Montreal, who built a home for himself on it in 1650.

The area around the marina is very pleasant to walk around, full of parks and nice activities to do. The largest Ferris wheel in Canada is there and Ariela was begging to go, but with a hefty price of $30 per person, and previous episodes of Ariela wanting to go up (smaller ones in California) and then getting cold feet seconds before boarding with tickets already purchased, we decided to not risk it this time.

We continued walking to the nearest metro station to take the metro a little north to Saint Louise Square which is surrounded by weird colorful old buildings. ……

We quickly stopped at the famous Saint Louis square with the Victorian houses.

The square was laid out in 1876 and has been described as one of Montréal’s most beautiful, with a European elegance thanks to its tree-lined paths and fountain. Students of poetry may want to pay homage to Émile Nelligan. A monument to the beloved Québecois writer sits in the southeast corner of the square near the house on avenue Laval where he once lived.

Sarah found a well-reviewed French restaurant nearby and we gave it a chance. It was spectacular, especially the French onion soup and the steak.

After a delicious meal we walked back to the hotel via Saint Denis St, which is full of restaurants and shops.

We found a very funny restaurant that looks like it is painted in 2D. Unfortunately, it was already closed.

Back at the hotel we went to sleep to be ready for another exciting Montreal Day.

Bonus pic of the day:

In this side of Canada, the doors are heavy!!!! so heavy that Sarah sometimes struggled opening them.