Montreal: Hiking on Your Day Trips
Montreal itself doesn’t have much hiking beyond one hill, honestly, which is exactly why a day-trip base pays off if you actually want trail time. Here’s the city option and the real hiking country around it.
In the city: Mount Royal
Mount Royal Park, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted (the same architect behind Central Park), is Montreal’s one real hiking spot, and it’s free. Trails climb from several access points to the Kondiaronk Belvedere, a lookout with a full panorama of the city skyline. It’s a short, manageable climb rather than a serious hike, closer to an hour or two round trip depending on your pace, but it’s a legitimate warm-up before the real thing further out.
The actual hiking day trip: the Laurentians
About 90 minutes north, Mont-Tremblant and the Laurentians are where hiking becomes the point rather than a bonus. The region runs as a ski village in winter, but from late spring through fall it switches to hiking and lake activities, with trails around the mountain and the surrounding lake country. This is close enough to do as a single day trip, but it’s also the destination on this whole list most worth turning into an overnight if you have a spare night, since a rushed round trip cuts into actual trail time.
Walking terrain in the Eastern Townships
The Eastern Townships, one to two hours southeast, are built around a wine route rather than marked trails, but the villages of Bromont and Sutton and the countryside around Magog and Lake Memphremagog make for good on-foot exploring between wine stops, especially during fall foliage season when the walking itself becomes the draw.
Planning around the season
Winter turns the Laurentians into ski country instead of hiking country, so this whole plan works best May through October. Mount Royal, being a city park, is walkable year-round, though a winter visit means snow and ice underfoot rather than a straightforward climb.
What to pack for either one
Mount Royal needs nothing more than regular walking shoes and water, since it’s a short urban climb on maintained paths. The Laurentians are a different scale: proper hiking shoes, layers even in summer since the mountain air runs cooler than the city, and enough water for a half-day out, since there’s no metro or STM bus back if you underestimate the return trip. A rental car is the only way in either way, so build fuel and parking into the day’s budget alongside Quebec’s 14.975% sales tax on anything you buy along the way.
Read more
For the rest of what’s outdoors around the city, see our nature spots guide , or check the full 8 day trips guide for the car and tour logistics of getting to the Laurentians.