Mont Royal

So Montreal has a mount, if not a mountain. A high hill that overlooks the city and is largely parkland (and a cemetery). So I took the bus up to it

Olympic stadium

 

The main sight of the area is the huge St Joseph's oratory. Like many such catholic edifices built a century or so ago, it seems a massive white elephant. Most of the Catholics here did not seem local, but on bus tours from elsewhere in the world. Its cavernous interior is obviously not much troubled with worshippers. Catholics seem to love to pour money into grandiose ostentatious projects, rather like tinpot dictators do.

It is only the crypt that looks appropriate for an actual church service

 

Musee des Beaux Arts, Montreal

So the Fine Arts Museum in Montreal. But first a spot of lunch. There is a street  nearby that once would have been big middle class hoses but is now mostly shops restaurants and bars, at least at ground level

I had a very pleasant lunch at table on edge of the street

And the area has public art outside too - Leonard Cohen is from Montreal and this is quite some mural

The museum/art gallery is actually on both sides of the main street, with an underground tunnel connecting them. On one side a new modern pavilion...

...and on the other in a neo-classical pavilion.

The delightful collection is international, but also as far as is possible given its lack of history, local too. Some great bronzes of native peoples 

A view from gallery roof top

A large Napoleonic section, reflecting Montreal's Frenchness

God I appreciated the seating in this place. I had never appreciated the plight of the elderly or infirmed before, but I could not have visited this place without all the many seats. I found essentially I could only look at one wall of a gallery before I had to head back to a seat and let my leg recover. Sciatica is a bitch.

My only gripe about the museum is they have no guidebook or catalogue to their own collection. Big giftshop but bereft of stuff from their own establishment!

Convenient bus stop outside the museum!

Outside the gallery there is a sculpture park