This was my first time visiting Montreal and I was looking forward to celebrating my birthday for the weekend. This airbnb was in the perfect location and had the space needed for the group of friends I was going to bring.
On arrival to the location, I took the advice of Shyva and parked in a parking garage a block away (located in a hotel parking structure, more on that later). It was fairly easy to find and a little confusing on how to get out but we eventually found our way.
The Airbnb is situated between restaurants and be prepared for a steep but manageable staircase to climb (pack light). The codes and getting in were all easy to understand and upon entering you can see that the space was very large. There were two kitchenettes, a pool table (on a slight slant, so there's an advantage for some people, if you play), the TV in the common space worked fine but we just turned it on to see if it worked. There are two bathrooms that are decently clean but obviously when you have a bunch of people coming in and out, I can see how it's hard to maintain a cleanliness to near perfection. The bedrooms were all a nice size. Two had full size beds and the other two had bunkbeds with a nice firm mattress. All the rooms had AC as well as the common area. One AC in the room I was staying in was just on fan mode and the AC didn't work. I communicated with Shyva about the AC but she didn't know how to fix the problem, but thankfully it wasn't too hot and we kept the door open for the cool air from the other AC's to come in. The kitchen seemed like it was fully equipped, we didn't use it so we didn't really explore the cabinets. Bathrooms had soap and shampoo which was nice. There is an outdoor patio area (the door was really hard to open and close). There's a spiral staircase that leads to what we believe was a hot tub but that was locked and we didn't have access. Also, some of the doors in this Airbnb are hard to open and close, just a forewarning. The walls are also pretty thin in this building, so you will hear other people outside walking up and down the staircase in the building and talking. It didn't effect my sleep though, so if you're a light sleeper maybe get one of the rooms away from the wall that can hear the other people.
Location was amazing! It's near great coffee shops, bars down the hill, restaurants all nearby and the gay village (which we were there for Montreal Pride) was an easy walk. We wanted to try their "subway system" (being from NYC) and it was great! It was a block away from the Airbnb, clean, reliable, very fast if want to get to somewhere a few miles away. I believe it stops running for a few hours in the early morning so don't rely on that mode of transportation if you're staying out really late!
Going back to the parking, I took the advice of Shyva's parking garage because we didn't know how street parking really worked when we first arrived, so finding the garage was fairly easy, there wasn't a clear sign of where to enter other than a door that looked like a garage door. It's $19USD for 24hrs which we thought was great! There were hardly any cars in there so we weren't sure if it was an active parking garage. But because we got in a little later than expected we just thought, "why not!" Getting out was a little confusing because the elevator took us out into a hotel lobby that was also empty so we weren't sure if the place we just parked in was closed, but the parking garage was open so we were still unsure. No one was at the front desk and we weren't sure how to get out at first but we finally found our way. Fast forward to the next day when the parking time for the car was reaching 24hrs, I wanted to just check on the car to see if it was ok. This was a Sunday and seeing that it was a hotel, I thought it would be open 24hrs, however, the hotel wasn't open and all the doors were locked. Including the restaurant that is attached to it. We looked online and realized that the hotel is under construction until Fall and the restaurant is closed on Sundays and doesn't open until 12pm the next day (Monday). The problem with this whole situation is that we were leaving early the next morning and had to figure out how to get this car. Freaking out, we called the hotel with no answer, we tried to call the restaurant with no answer, we basically tried everything to get into this garage. I even contacted Shyva to see if she knew anything about it since she recommended it. Unfortunately, she didn't know either, which was a little upsetting seeing that she recommended this place and said she only recommended it because she saw that there were great reviews. She said try to see if there's a security guard for the garage, which there isn't. No one was around and we felt very helpless and stressed. Finally we stood by the garage door that still had an "open" lit sign and we contemplated for about 20-30 minutes on how to get into this structure. We thought about asking a stranger with a car to just drive up to the garage door because we assumed that's the ONLY way it opens, but we were afraid being foreign that no one would care. BUT...FINALLY...some random stranger who wanted to park in that structure drove up to the door and it magically opened! I followed behind and was