Vaughan to Montreal: the six-hour drive that becomes the weekend

Montreal, the most-searched trip on this site

"Toronto to Montreal" is the most-searched road trip in Canada and Vaughan's share of it is the family weekend, the group's festival trip and the couple's anniversary — a six-hour drive down the 401 to a city that speaks French, eats better than any other in the country, and fills its summer with festivals that close its streets. Old Montreal's cobblestones and the Basilica of Notre-Dame, the Old Port's Ferris wheel and its river, the Plateau's bagels and smoked meat, Mount Royal's lookout over the city, the Biodome and the Botanical Garden for the children, the Bell Centre for the Canadiens, the Jazz Festival and Just for Laughs in July, the Formula 1 weekend in June — the reasons are the city's own; the chauffeured version exists because six hours of the 401 with a family is the trip's price, and a Sprinter with the family at the tables and the parents facing each other pays it differently. The Montreal Grand Prix post covers the race weekend; this one covers the rest.

The drive, and why the Sprinter beats the train

The 407 east to the 401, the 401 east through Kingston and Cornwall to the Quebec border, Autoroute 20 along the St. Lawrence into the city — or Autoroute 40 from Vaudreuil if the hotel is on the north side — five and a half hours from Thornhill with the 407 and one Kingston stop, six with a family's two stops. The train from Union Station is five hours and a good product for one or two; for a family of five it is five fares, the drive to Union, the taxi in Montreal and the luggage on the platform, and the Sprinter — one fare from the driveway to the hotel's porte-cochère with the bags in the bay — is the cheaper and easier version, which is the arithmetic that fills this site's Sprinters every summer Friday. The plane is an hour in the air and four on the ground.

The city, for a family weekend

Two nights and three days: Friday's arrival at the hotel — Old Montreal's boutique hotels, the downtown towers on René-Lévesque, or a Plateau apartment — and dinner in the Old Port; Saturday's Old Montreal — Notre-Dame Basilica, the Old Port's Grande Roue, the Pointe-à-Callière museum for the older children, a Bota Bota spa hour for the parents — with the Plateau's bagels at Fairmount or St-Viateur and the smoked meat at Schwartz's for lunch, Mount Royal's lookout at dusk, and the Bell Centre if the Canadiens are home; Sunday's Biodome, Botanical Garden and Insectarium at the Olympic Park for the children, or the Jean-Talon Market for the parents, and the 401 home by two with the family asleep by Cornwall. The Tourisme Montréal site has the festivals' dates; the vehicle staying is what makes the Olympic Park and Mount Royal part of the weekend, because neither is a walk from Old Montreal.

The festivals

Montreal's summer is a run of festivals that close Sainte-Catherine Street and the Quartier des Spectacles: the Jazz Festival at the end of June and the start of July, Just for Laughs in July, Osheaga at Parc Jean-Drapeau in August, the fireworks competition over the river on summer Saturdays, Nuit Blanche in winter, and the Grand Prix in June. A group of Vaughan friends books a Sprinter for a festival weekend: the drive Friday, the free outdoor stages Saturday afternoon, a ticketed show Saturday night, and the drive home Sunday with nobody having driven anything — the shape of half the summer's Montreal bookings from Woodbridge.

The Canadiens and the Bell Centre

A Canadiens home game is a Vaughan hockey family's pilgrimage and a Leafs-Canadiens night is the one they book in October: a Luxury SUV or Sprinter down on the game day with a Kingston lunch, the hotel by the Bell Centre, the game, and the drive home the next morning. The Bell Centre's drop is on de la Gauchetière at the doors; the chauffeur waits in the district's garages.

Where the vehicle goes in Montreal

Old Montreal's streets are narrow, one-way and in summer partly pedestrian; the hotels' porte-cochères are on the perimeter and the chauffeur knows which; downtown's towers have loops; the Plateau has street parking that a Sprinter does not use. The vehicle staying means the chauffeur drives the family to the Olympic Park, Mount Royal, the Bell Centre and Jean-Talon and parks in the garages the city has for the purpose — the family walks Old Montreal and the Plateau, which is how the city is meant to be seen. A family that will walk everything releases the vehicle and books the return.

Which vehicle

A Sprinter for a family of five or more, a group, or two families with the tables and the bay; an SUV for a family of four with boosters at $25 each; a Premium Sedan for a couple's anniversary weekend at a Vieux-Montréal hotel with the return pair. The corporate version — a Vaughan company's delegation to a Montreal client, the conference at the Palais des congrès — is the Sprinter on the corporate account with the team working at the tables for five hours.

What the fare replaces

Twelve hours of the 401 in a weekend; five train fares and two taxis; the hotel's valet; the Olympic Park's lot; and the drive home on a Sunday afternoon with the Cornwall-to-Kingston stretch ahead. The daily-hire fare for a Sprinter of eight is a number the group divides into a per-person figure that beats the train; for a couple the return pair is the comfort of six hours each way done by someone else, and the site says so.

Seasons

June for the Grand Prix, July for the festivals, August for Osheaga and the fireworks, October to April for the Canadiens, February for Nuit Blanche and the Igloofest, December for the Old Port's Christmas markets and the lights, May and September for the quiet city and the hotels' shoulder rates. The 401 in January between Kingston and Cornwall is a winter corridor and a chauffeured Sprinter on winter tires is the reason a February Montreal weekend happens.

Pairing it

Montreal pairs with Ottawa for the two-city weekend, with Quebec City for the Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec loop, with Mont-Tremblant ninety minutes north for a ski-and-city week, and with the Eastern Townships an hour east for a lake-and-city one.

The weekend, in order, for a family of five

Friday: the Sprinter from Thornhill at 8 a.m. with boosters and a weekend's bags in the bay; the 407 and 401 with the children at the tables; Kingston at 11:15 for lunch by the harbour; Cornwall at one; the border's welcome sign; Autoroute 20 along the river; the Old Montreal hotel's porte-cochère on rue Saint-Paul's perimeter at 3:15; the vehicle to the garage; the Old Port's Grande Roue at five and dinner on Saint-Paul. Saturday: Notre-Dame's tour at nine on foot, Place Jacques-Cartier, the Pointe-à-Callière museum's archaeological crypt for the eleven-year-old; the Sprinter at noon for the Plateau — Fairmount bagels, Schwartz's line for the smoked meat — Mount Royal's Chalet lookout at three with the chauffeur at the Beaver Lake lot; the Bell Centre at seven for the Canadiens with the drop on de la Gauchetière. Sunday: the Sprinter at 9:30 to the Olympic Park — the Biodome's penguins and the Botanical Garden's Chinese garden until one — the Jean-Talon Market for lunch and the bay's cheese, Autoroute 20 at 2:30, and Thornhill by 8:30 with three children asleep from Cornwall. Two days of daily hire plus the drives, one number in the booking engine, and a weekend whose only driving was watched from a table.

Old Montreal and the Old Port, for planning

The Old City is a grid of a dozen streets between rue Notre-Dame and the river: Notre-Dame Basilica on Place d'Armes with its blue-and-gold interior and the evening light show; Place Jacques-Cartier's square running down to the port; rue Saint-Paul's galleries, shops and restaurants; the Bonsecours Market's dome; the Old Port's promenade with the Grande Roue, the zipline, the Science Centre's IMAX and the Bota Bota spa on a boat; the Pointe-à-Callière museum on the city's founding site. It is walked, the vehicle is in the garage, and a family's Saturday morning is inside it without a car in mind.

The Plateau, Mile End and the food

North of downtown the Plateau and Mile End are the city's neighbourhoods of triplexes with outdoor staircases, the bagel bakeries of Saint-Viateur and Fairmount, Schwartz's smoked meat on Saint-Laurent, the cafés of avenue du Mont-Royal, the Jean-Talon Market's stalls in Little Italy, and Parc La Fontaine — the afternoon that a family with the Sprinter drives to and walks in, because the Plateau is a twenty-minute walk from the Old City and a family of five with a nine-year-old does not make it twice. The Tourisme Montréal site has the neighbourhoods' walks.

The corporate version

A Vaughan company's four-person delegation to a Montreal client or the Palais des congrès: the Sprinter at seven with the team at the tables and the deck on the screens, a Kingston coffee, the hotel by one, the meetings, the dinner in Old Montreal, and the drive home the next afternoon with the debrief on the way — one line on the corporate account's invoice against four train fares, four taxis and a rental car, and a team that worked for five hours instead of sitting in a coach seat.

Pickup notes

The 407 east from Weston Road for Woodbridge and Kleinburg, Jane for Maple and the VMC, Dufferin or Bathurst for Thornhill and Concord, then the 401; the fare, quoted from the exact address, includes the toll. Give us the hotel, the nights, the game or the festival, the seats, the loads and whether the vehicle stays; the chauffeur confirms the plan the evening before.

Booking it

Book a daily hire from your Vaughan address for the weekend with the hotel, the nights and the days' plans, or a return pair for a couple; tell us the seats, the loads, the game or the festival and the addresses in order, and the chauffeur confirms the plan the evening before with the 401's forecast on it.

Book the Montreal weekend