There is nothing like the beautiful colors of fall foliage. Especially the maple trees that turn all shades of red, orange, and purple.
While we love living in Florida and being able to do outdoor activities year-round, the changing of the seasons is definitely something we miss.
We love to come up to Montreal around mid-October to see the fall colors. When living there, we would often drive up to the Laurentians looking for that perfect still lake with colorful reflections of leaves mirrored in them against a clear blue sky. The scenic drive was part of our seasonal routine along with apple picking after the first frost or going to a cabane à sucre in the spring. Yum yum!
Truth be told, just like predicting the weather, the ‘peak season’ for foliage is elusive and typically occurs sometime in October, but you never know for sure. Some years you can have a windy and rainy fall and with a strong storm blowing away all the leaves and leaving the trees bare. Other years you can have multiple weeks of beautiful viewing. Something akin to the cherry blossom season in Japan where you can go from north to south looking for the best blooms, it is the same around Montreal.
The colors will generally start changing in the Laurentians where it gets colder first. They will then start in the Eastern Townships and the South Shore. Montreal, the city itself, seems to generate more heat and will usually see the change in colors last.
What really starts the process is the lengthening of the nighttime hours. As the nights grow longer and cooler, this triggers biochemical processes in the leaves which lead to another masterpiece of nature.
The Canadian sugar maples are just beautiful trees. Aside from providing that famous maple syrup, these trees give the brightest and most vivid colors in the fall. The leaves contain three pigments: carotene, xanthophyll, and anthocyanin. They turn more yellow in the shade, bright red in the sun, and can even change shades from orange to red. The higher the content of sugar in the leaves the brighter and more spectacular the color.
Bonjour Quebec has a Fall Color Tracker which shows many great places to go and see autumn colors. It even shows some predictions around the timing and the best times to go.
We found that this year it was a little off as it predicted a peak viewing up north but many of the trees were already bare. We ended up taking a day trip to Mount Tremblant and while viewing was better in Montreal we still loved the scenic views along the old highway.
A previous year we were also a little late, so we started by seeing Beaver Lake in Montreal’s Mount Royal Park and later headed to the South Shore around Mt. Saint-Bruno.
We also got a tip that the colors were just perfect in Rigaud. So, we drove west to Mt. Rigaud where we were able to ride the chair lift to the top of the hill and enjoy some picturesque views of the fields below and breathe the fresh air.
We very much enjoy spending the day close to nature admiring the outside and breathing in the cool air. A great escape from the 90-100 degree heat wave in Miami. The cool weather is always a nice reminder of our Canadian heritage and even if our blood has thinned and some years we find ourselves shivering and have to get all bundled up, it is still a wonderful experience.
If you get to come out to Montreal (or even New England, where there are many sugar maples), do try to time your visit to see the beautiful fall foliage. It’s a treat for the senses. A masterpiece of nature!
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