Bonsecours Bassin

In Montreal, the past is present, in ecclesiastical buildings from the era of New France, and in 19th-century palaces of commerce. By zoning and by preference, these wonderful old bones are converted or absorbed into new uses, as hotels and offices and colleges and condos, rather than be replaced. The newer wing of the Museum of Fine Arts subsumes a heritage apartment building, while some of its galleries stretch under the street, another hallmark of the montreal urban style. The Montreal World Trade Center preserves the facades of period commercial buildings, with a fiber-optic interior.

But there are also purely modern additions, most notably the new high-tech Bibliothèque Nationale (provincial library) on the eastern side of downtown, and the recently expanded convention center (Palais des Congrès). Its trademark multihued facade is a beacon in the continent’s number-two convention destination. Along with it comes a new city square in the financial center, Place Jean-Paul Riopelle.

Decades ago, Place Ville-Marie blurred the lines between building and streetscape and indoor passages, and it remains the crossroads of the underground city. Passages, concourses, sheltered lanes and covered plazas continue to expand and intersect, even while work on the city above appears largely completed. When the temperature heads south, descend to the village of shops and cafés along the indoor lanes of Montreal’s central station, or onward to the shopping complexes of Eaton Centre and Place de la Cathédrale.

Notre Dame Basilica

Place d’Armes is the starting point of a walk in old Montreal. Notre Dame Basilica and the adjacent 17th-century old sulpician seminary, on one side, square off against the secular domed headquarters of the original bank of Montreal and its newer tower on the other. Just down the hill is the old port, with amusements and a science centre that mainly attract kids, though the Riverside Clock Tower is worth a climb for the view to the botanical gardens and fort on St. Helen’s Island. Turn your back to the river to view a virtually intact 19th-century seaport along cobbled Rue de la Commune. Finish off by descending into the excavations of early Montreal at the Pointe à Callière Archeological Museum.

But don’t put the sights before your Montreal experience. Browse antique shops and galleries along Rue St. Paul and in the Bonsecours Market, or hire a carriage to clip-clop over cobblestones along the waterfront. In summer, enjoy an aperitif on a terrasse on wide Place Jacques-Cartier sloping down to the river. Or head into a bistro on Rue St. Paul, and savor a wintry street scene through frosty windows.

A rare pleasure for a large city is finding countryside, recreation and mountains just beyond the city gates. At Bromont, in the eastern townships, relax after a day of business with Quebec’s signature nighttime skiing on floodlit slopes, or steam in an oriental hammam at Spa Bromont. And if the weather’s fine, tarry in the vineyards on the way out or back. Even in the city, Montrealers cross-country ski in forested Mount Royal park right above downtown.