Montreal, Quebec: Biodome

Montreal hosts the Summer Olympics in 1976, and many of the activities were centered around the Olympic Stadium east of downtown. Once the Games were over, Montreal was left with a large space in the middle of a reasonably residential area. What to do?

Turn the space into other useful attractions, of course.

The Biodome might be the most interesting. It contains four different ecosystems that Canada hosts - rain forest, maple forest, Gulf of St. Lawrence and sub-polar region. There are animals, birds and plants from each region represented.

The building is laid out into four different quadrants, so visitors start walking on one path that winds its way through all of them. The sub-polar exhibit might have been my favorite, but that may be because the staff was feeding the penguins. The puffins are mighty cute too.

The picture to the right probably needs to be clicked on in order to see it in increased size. There are indeed lots and lots of birds on the recreated cliffs of the St. Lawrence, which overlooks a large amount of water.

Olympic Park has many more attractions, including a planetarium, soccer stadium, and movie theaters. The actual stadium is there as well, even if baseball's Expos are long gone. The area does have a large underground parking garage as well.

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