Pierre Elliott Trudeau Park

UPDATED: I redid all the pictures in 2020

Original post from 2017:
After waiting for the winter to pass, this was our first major park visit in 2017. 

On a beautiful spring morning at about 7:30am (really), all four of us drove to Côte Saint-Luc (which is always closer than I think it will be) and this park was like an oasis in the distance. Am I being dramatic? Yes. Because it was AWESOME.
Original & creative, funky & cool, and with age appropriate equipment for my 4-year old and just turned 9-year old.
And a 43-year old. “Climb higher! HIGHER!!”

It’s pretty hard to impress my older kid. He’s been to a couple of playgrounds. So it’s got to be really good. And he didn’t want to leave. Score.
 
The park itself is beautiful. There’s the Human Rights Walkway and the impressive Shalom Bloom Sculpture Garden which features stunning bronze animal sculptures along a meandering path. 
There are also baseball fields, the chalet (with wheelchair accessible washrooms), the picturesque pond where you can rent pedal boats during the summer, and a colourful and shady splash pad.

Close to the corner of Stephen Leacock and Louis Pasteur is the brand new playground. The equipment by Kompan is a mixture of ropes, rubber and metal contraptions which you can climb, swing from, and slide down. 
My big kids got a kick out of seeing how high they could make each other fly into the air on the cool rubber bridge…thing (just watch your fingers in the rollers), while the little one hung onto the vertical ropes. “I am in the jungle!!”
The rope climber is immense and you can climb the sides and all over the top, then down through the “black hole”.
There are little hammocks, a Supernova spinner (also known as “the hamster wheel”), the interesting Miram which is kind of like a skateboard/surfboard, and multiple balance beams.

Just past the itty-bitty sandbox area is the toddler section. Again, it’s not a traditional stairs-and-slide combo, but rather there’s an interesting obstacle course structure where kids can go up (or down) the rubber slide and across the mini rope waves. There is also a spinner, a little bouncer, and a ground level activity panel for those only four apples high. 
You’ll also find two baby swings, adult swings, and the fantastic Expression parent-baby swing

Couple of things to note:
-The splash pad hours of operation are: 9am-9pm.
-You can see the pedal boat rental rates and hours for 2022 HERE
-There are benches and picnic tables either in or around the playground. The city has added umbrellas to the tables so you can have snacks in the shade, and there are large shade structures over the cable climbers.
-The playground is fenced and gated along one side (near the lake), but partially open at the back.
-Both toddler and older kid sections are on wood chips with a concrete wheelchair/stroller ramp down. 

It’s space-age-y and weird, and that’s exactly what we liked about it. 

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