One of my favorite ways to explore a city is via bike. So when we found ourselves with a free day to spend biking through the city I was excited to take advantage of it. Looking through several options for guided bike tours, Ca Roule Montreal's tours seemed by far the best. However, to be a bit more adventurous i thought it would be fun to rent bikes and do a self guided tour. I placed the reservations online a day in advance and was pleasantly surprised to find that the bikes were ready to go for us by the time we arrived in the morning. I couldn't decide between exploring the city's neighborhoods vs biking the Canal bike path that hits right next to Ca Roule, so decided to do both!
First, we biked up to Le Plateu-Mount Royal neighborhood for some famous Montreal bagels at St Viateur. After breakfast, kept going north exploring various parks embedded into the Mile End/Le Plateu neighborhoods until reaching Jean Talon market. This was a good place to stop for some refreshments . After exploring Mount Royal a bit more, biked over to Westmont to see some of the beautiful homes in the area. Then headed over to Canal path, past Atwood Market (which was closed by this time since its was getting late), and took the path all the way back to Ca Roule to return the bikes. Since it was sunset by this time, it was great to see some really scenic views of Montreal biking back.
All in all, i thought the self guided route was a good way for a Montreal first timer to explore a wonderfully bike friendly city. The whole path was probably about 25-30 miles. Thanks to Ca Roule for the quick service and reasonable rental prices.