Mount Royal Park

Beaver Lake, Mount Royal Park, Montreal.

After he designed Central Park in New York, Frederick Law Olmsted was in demand as a landscape architect.

About twenty years after Central Park opened, another of Olmsted’s designs opened in Montreal. Mount Royal Park was never finished exactly to Olmsted’s plan, but a visit to this 692 acres, which covers the top of Mount Royal, reveals many of the fundamentals of Olmsted’s design pattern.

It is a mix of un-tamed nature and man-made hideaways and vistas.

At the center of the park is the well-shaped Beaver Lake. Its gentle curves have the qualities of a Japanese garden. There are well-groomed hills and meadows, dotted with sculpture, and miles of roads and trails protected by shady trees and well-used by hikers, runners, and bicyclists.

On the perimeter of the park there are several overlook points offering views of Montreal. You might not suspect it, but Mount Royal is a volcano. It hasn’t been active for about 125 million years.

There is a fee for parking, but Mount Royal Park is open year round and there is no charge for entry.