We wanted to feel like we’d traveled somewhere foreign without spending a day in airports getting there. Montreal is the easiest version of that from the Hudson Valley. Five hours in the car, you cross a border, the signs change to French, and you’re somewhere else. We pulled the kids out of school early on a Friday in November 2023 — Henry was 10, Elias was 9 — and headed north.
We broke the trip in Plattsburgh because we have dear friends there who are professors at SUNY Plattsburgh. They have twins born the exact same day as Henry, which is the kind of coincidence that becomes its own small gravity in a friendship. The boys had been built-in buddies since they were small. We did dinner at a local arcade bar — good burgers, good wings for the adults, $40 worth of quarters for the four kids — and called it an early night.
From Plattsburgh it’s another 45 minutes to an hour to Montreal. The French signs start showing up before you fully realize you’ve crossed, which is the foreign-land feeling kicking in right on schedule. We did, while still figuring out the highway exits, accidentally pull into a border patrol parking lot. We then had to find a human to open the gate to let us out. The agent was extremely polite about it. We were extremely embarrassed.
We stayed at the Hotel Nelligan in Old Montreal on Rue Saint-Paul Ouest. The single best decision we made the entire trip was the valet parking. Montreal’s old town is a maze of one-way streets that are running the wrong direction from wherever you’re trying to go, and once we handed over the keys and forgot about the car for three days, the city opened up.
Old Montreal is built for walking. We started by wandering Rue St-Louis to see some of the oldest houses in the city, looped past City Hall, and zigzagged the historic district. We had lunch at a small café somewhere on Rue Notre-Dame — I don’t remember the name — and peeked into Notre-Dame Basilica during the day, knowing we had Mozart Requiem tickets there for that evening.
The afternoon was the Montreal Science Centre on the waterfront, which turned out to be a real one. We spent about three hours, all four of us actually engaged. The 3D IMAX about flight was excellent, and they had a film about the International Space Station that was setting us up for the VR experience we had booked for the next day. The orbital perspective shots were the kind of thing that’s good for kids and adults equally — sort of pleasantly disorienting.
Right next to the Science Centre at the Old Port is La Grande Roue de Montréal, the giant ferris wheel. I have a personal theory that ferris wheels are a useful navigation tool when you first arrive in a city — you get a single elevated look at the whole grid and your brain builds the map faster. (This theory has limits. Your mileage may vary. The kids do not endorse the theory.) We got our own enclosed car and went up. The view was worth the brief I-don’t-love-this moment in the middle.
That evening we walked back to Notre-Dame Basilica for “REQUIEM de Mozart” performed by the Société philharmonique du Nouveau Monde. The basilica itself is the headline — it’s one of the most beautiful spaces I’ve ever stood in. The musicians were excellent. The concert ran long and I will admit, with all four of us getting fidgety in the pew by hour two, that I started thinking about dinner. Some culture-and-kids equations work cleanly and some don’t. The architecture was the win regardless.
Dinner was Stash Café — Polish food, which I would not have thought to order in Montreal, and which was exactly the right kind of heavy after a long day.
The next morning was where things got interesting.
We had breakfast at the hotel in shifts because Jennifer and I are early risers and the boys are not. We headed back to the waterfront park, which has fantastic views of the city and an even better view of Habitat 67, the apartment complex Moshe Safdie designed for Expo 67. Jennifer studied architecture and gets a particular look on her face around things like that. It was a good morning.
Our Plattsburgh friends drove up to meet us — six of them, four of us, ten people total — for our scheduled afternoon doing Space Explorers: The Infinite, the immersive virtual International Space Station VR thing. They got to the hotel and we went to a nearby burger and pizza place for pre-experience fuel.
And that’s where Elias started feeling not great.
We took him back to the hotel room to rest. He stepped out of the elevator and projectile-vomited across the entire elevator landing. It was spectacular. I felt awful for Elias and worse for the housekeeping staff, and we eventually left them a much more generous tip on checkout, because the math on what we’d just asked them to deal with was not balanced any other way.
I stayed with Elias. Jennifer and Henry went down to the lobby to keep our friends company. When it was time to walk over to The Infinite, we asked Elias if he wanted to try, and he, being Elias, said yes.
He made it about ninety seconds into the VR. We got fitted with headsets, walked into the portal, the experience started, and he grabbed my arm and said he had to leave right now. Staff were great. They led us out a back exit while everyone else stayed in. We made it back to the hotel without a second incident. Jennifer and Henry reported afterward that the VR was incredible. Apparently I will have to take their word for it, possibly forever.
The next morning Elias was fine, which is the part where you remember kids are made of different material than adults are. We took a taxi over to Mile End for a neighborhood-shift kind of day. Mile End feels nothing like Old Montreal — residential, artsy, vintage shops, indie bookstores, the kind of neighborhood you walk slowly through.
We spotted a tiny storefront — just a little window operation — that reminded all of us of the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld, in the best way. We were on foot and didn’t have a way to carry anything, so we walked past, and I later looked it up and the reviews were excellent. Sometimes you find the place and don’t get to eat there and that’s just how it goes.
A few places we did go in Mile End. Drawn & Quarterly on Rue Bernard Ouest is a great graphic novel and book store. The kids each found new books from series they were following. We bought too many. St-Viateur Bagel on Saint Viateur Street West for the Montreal bagel pilgrimage — important to know going in that Montreal bagels are not New York bagels. They’re smaller, sweeter, denser, baked in a wood-fired oven. Different food, different city, different name on it. Adjust expectations and they’re fantastic. We also walked past Drogheria Fine on Avenue Fairmount, a tiny gnocchi place open 11 AM to 9 PM. We didn’t eat there. It looked incredible. Next trip.
We Ubered back to the hotel to meet up with my friend Alicia, who I’d known from my visual effects days. She’d moved to Montreal years earlier to work in VFX for film and TV — Montreal had been a major post-production hub because of generous tax incentives. The Quebec government then removed the incentives for post work, and most of the major studios picked up and left. Her projects had wound down with them. The silver lining: she’d landed work in Vancouver and was about to move there with her husband. We met at Wolf & Workman Pub right by the hotel, which is apparently where the local VFX crowd lands after work. Solid pub food, good catch-up, and a reminder that the industries we work in are mostly held together by where the tax credits happen to be that year. (Vancouver trip on the list now.)
Checkout day we retrieved the car from the valet and drove to the Expo area for our final round. Parking at the Insectarium was its own small adventure, but once we were inside the Insectarium it was worth it. Beautiful insect collections, a live butterfly zone where they’re flying around you, the kind of place where the kids stop talking and you know it’s hitting. Around the corner is the Montreal Biosphere on Saint Helen’s Island in Parc Jean-Drapeau — five different ecosystems under one roof, walk-through, immersive. We did both back-to-back, which was probably one museum too many but they were both excellent.
Then back to the car and south toward the Hudson Valley.
Montreal delivered exactly what we’d hoped — the foreign-land feel of an actual international trip in a long weekend. French signs, beautiful architecture, walkable neighborhoods, a different food culture, and the bonus that we got to see how a city we hadn’t been to before treats its kids and its public spaces, both of which it treats well.
We’d go back. Older kids, longer trip, no vomiting if possible.
The Reference Version
The four-day version of what we actually did, plus what worked and what we’d change.
The drive. About five hours from the mid-Hudson Valley to Montreal, breaking in Plattsburgh because we had friends to see. If you don’t have a Plattsburgh stop, you can do it in one shot. The border crossing was easy and quick. Have your passports ready and don’t accidentally pull into the border patrol parking lot.
Where to stay. Hotel Nelligan in Old Montreal on Rue Saint-Paul Ouest. Central, the building has character, the staff is excellent. The valet parking is what makes it worth it — once you let go of the car, the rest of the trip is easier. Family rooms are tight; if you’re four people you can make it work but don’t expect a suite.
Day 1, Old Montreal. Walk Rue St-Louis for the oldest houses in the city. Loop past City Hall. Lunch on Rue Notre-Dame. Afternoon at the Montreal Science Centre at the Old Port (give it three hours, do the 3D IMAX). La Grande Roue de Montréal right next door if your kids will tolerate it. Evening: Notre-Dame Basilica — daytime visit is free and worth it. We did a Mozart Requiem concert there in the evening which was beautiful but ran long for the kids. The basilica itself is the standout, with or without a concert. Dinner at Stash Café (Polish, hearty, near the hotel).
Day 2, waterfront and VR. Waterfront park in the morning for views of Habitat 67, the Moshe Safdie apartment building from Expo 67 — even if you’re not an architecture person it’s a striking piece of building. Then The Infinite, the International Space Station VR experience — book tickets in advance. About an hour for the experience itself. Worth it according to the half of our family that made it through without incident.
Day 3, Mile End. Take a taxi or Uber to Mile End and spend the day there. Drawn & Quarterly for graphic novels and books. St-Viateur Bagel for the Montreal bagel education. Walk past Drogheria Fine for gnocchi if it’s open. Many vintage shops, art galleries, indie storefronts. The neighborhood vibe is the point. Evening at Wolf & Workman Pub back near the hotel — good pub food, regular crowd, doesn’t feel touristy.
Day 4, Espace pour la vie. Drive (you’ll have the car back) to the Expo area for the Insectarium and the Biosphere. Both are part of Espace pour la vie. Parking at the Insectarium is mildly annoying but doable. We did both back-to-back; if your kids hit museum-fatigue easily you can split them across two days or do just one. The butterfly room at the Insectarium and the rainforest ecosystem at the Biosphere are the standouts. Then back to the car and south.
What worked. Hotel Nelligan’s valet was the single best decision of the trip. The Science Centre is a real one — interactive, well-designed, kept all four of us engaged. Mile End on its own day was the right move; don’t try to wedge it into a half-afternoon. The Insectarium and Biosphere being right next to each other made the final morning easy. Pre-booking The Infinite, the concert, and the Science Centre meant we never wasted time in lines.
What we’d do differently. Skip the Mozart Requiem with kids that age — pick a shorter event or just visit the basilica during the day. Don’t try to drive in Old Montreal; once we let the valet have the car, everything got easier. Maybe split the Insectarium and Biosphere across two days instead of doing both at the end. And maybe pack motion sickness remedies; in retrospect the IMAX and the cab rides may not have helped the situation that culminated on the elevator landing.
Things to know. Montreal bagels are not New York bagels — adjust expectations. Many restaurants run on European hours (late dinners, midday lunch closures). French is the operating language but English is universally understood; the kids practiced their school French and got encouragement for trying. The 5-hour drive from the Hudson Valley is totally manageable in a day each way.
Booking links recap. Hotel Nelligan · Montreal Science Centre · La Grande Roue · The Infinite VR · Drawn & Quarterly · St-Viateur Bagel · Wolf & Workman Pub · Insectarium · Biosphere.
Even that's Odd 
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