Montreal Olympic Park- Parc Olympique
Montréal Olympic Park was a big draw for us as we are a whole family of Olympic fans! We weren’t sure what all there was to see or do, but we knew we needed to be there on our visit.
First of all, the Olympic park is humongous. Be prepared for this! There are also many partner attractions nearby and not so nearby related to the Olympic park.
Montréal hosted the Olympics in 1976. I know there was some controversy surrounding it. Montréal was an underdog for the host, but did win the selection as host. The city reportedly lost $1.5 billion dollars hosting it, supposedly due to poor planning and corruption. Twenty-nine nations, mostly African, boycotted the Montréal games because they refused to ban New Zealand after the New Zealand national rugby team had toured South Africa earlier that year in defiance of the UN call for a sporting embargo.
But anyway, in 2022, upon our visit, our kids were unaware of any of that history, and were able to just be thrilled about being in a place that hosted the Olympics!
We started by walking through the Esplanade and taking it all in. Unfortunately, the Montréal Tower was closed for renovations, but it was still an amazing structure to view from the outside and inside. We just couldn’t go up. Next time!
We visited the Olympic Stadium- what an impressive place! We also visited Saputo Stadium where the Montréal Impact major league soccer team plays.
The most exciting thing for us, I think, was visiting the Sports Centre. This is a multi-sports complex that includes a gym, pools, and fitness rooms. We considered coming back to swim there as it is open for public swim sometimes! We got to watch some swimming competition happening, as well as some martial arts going on. The kids were excited to sit in the stands. Very cool!
Of course, we really enjoyed the Olympic rings everywhere.
A fun stop in Montréal!