Ottawa Day Trip From Montreal: Guided Day Tour Options

Ottawa is the one Canadian capital you can reach from Montreal on a guided day tour and still sleep in your Montreal hotel that night. The trip is a long day, roughly 7:00 am to 7:00 pm, run by Concord Tours and Travel with a guide who speaks English and French, departing from 99 Avenue Viger Ouest. There is exactly one guided Ottawa product in the more-day-trips category here, which makes the decision simple: the question is less which operator and more whether Ottawa is the right day trip for your dates compared with Quebec City, Mont-Tremblant or the Eastern Townships.

This guide walks through what the tour covers, what it costs, what is and is not included, and how it compares with the other day trips out of Montreal. Figures come from the tour pages themselves. The goal is that a reader can finish this page, open the tour page and book with a clear picture of the day ahead: the early start, the two anchor stops, the lunch you pay for yourself and the evening return.

Is An Ottawa Day Tour From Montreal Worth The Long Day?

An Ottawa day tour from Montreal is worth it if you want Canada's Parliament Hill, the ByWard Market and the capital's riverside setting without renting a car or studying a bus timetable. The guided day runs 12 hours, from about 7:00 am to 7:00 pm, and the trade is simple: a long day on a coach for a full afternoon in Ottawa with a bilingual guide. If you would rather stay closer, shorter day trips from Montreal exist.

The tour is the Ottawa City One Day Tour, operated by Concord Tours and Travel, the same company running the Quebec City and Mont-Tremblant coach days from Montreal. It meets at 99 Avenue Viger Ouest in downtown Montreal and returns there in the evening. The guide speaks English and French, which matters in a country where the capital itself flips between the two languages on its street signs.

What you give up is time. Twelve hours is a little shorter than the Quebec City days, which run 13 to 14 hours, and much longer than the Mont-Tremblant trip at 8 hours 30 minutes. You leave early, you ride, you get a solid block of time in Ottawa, and you ride home. That is the shape of the day, and it is worth being honest about it: two long coach legs bracket a rewarding middle.

What you get back is the capital without logistics. Ottawa rewards walking: Parliament Hill, the ByWard Market, the canal and the river are all compact enough that a guided day with free time covers the essentials. Readers weighing whether the day works at all may find the blog answer on can you do a day tour to Ottawa from Montreal useful alongside this comparison.

A note on expectations: the review pool for this tour is small, 12 reviews, too few to treat as a strong signal either way. The operator's bigger products carry hundreds and thousands of reviews, so the Ottawa day is best judged on its itinerary and price rather than on a thin rating. That is not a reason to skip it; it is a reason to read the itinerary closely and decide whether the two named stops match what you want from the capital.

First-time visitors to Canada often pick Ottawa precisely because it is the seat of federal government: the ceremonies, the architecture and the national institutions give the city a character distinct from Montreal's older, French-founded streets. Repeat visitors to the region sometimes choose it as a complement, pairing a Montreal city tour with a capital day before or after.

What Does The Ottawa City One Day Tour Include?

The Ottawa City One Day Tour includes roundtrip transport from Montreal, an English and French speaking guide and gratuities, from $71.66 per person. It does not include meals, Parliament Hill admission or ByWard Market admission, and it states free cancellation with a full refund up to 24 hours before the start. The group cap is 50 and the meeting point is 99 Avenue Viger Ouest.

The included list is short and clear: roundtrip transportation from Montreal to Ottawa running about 7:00 am to 7:00 pm, the bilingual guide, and gratuities. That last item is unusual among these tours: gratuities are usually optional extras, so the price you see is closer to the price you pay than on many coach tours.

The not-included list matters more for budgeting. Meals are not included, so plan for lunch in Ottawa, most likely around the ByWard Market, which is one of the city's eating hubs. Admission and optional activities are excluded too. The itinerary lists Parliament Hill and ByWard Market admission as not included, and any optional tickets you might want in Ottawa are on you.

Parliament itself deserves a line of explanation. The Parliament of Canada runs guided tours of the Senate of Canada Building and the House of Commons at West Block, booked through the Parliament's own site at visit.parl.ca, and government photo ID is required for the House of Commons at West Block. Booking that Parliament ticket yourself, ahead of the tour date, is the single best way to make the Ottawa stop count.

The full details, dates and availability for the day are on the Ottawa City One Day Tour page, or you can check availability directly. For readers mapping all the coach options at once, the wider day tours from Montreal compared guide puts the four day-trip categories side by side.

How Much Does An Ottawa Day Trip From Montreal Cost?

The guided Ottawa day tour costs from $71.66 per person, which covers roundtrip coach transport, the bilingual guide and gratuities. Budget on top of that for lunch, roughly the cost of a market meal, plus any optional admissions in Ottawa. The Parliament's own tours must be booked through the Parliament site with photo ID for West Block.

At $71.66, the Ottawa day sits at the accessible end of this site's day-trip range. For context: the cheapest tours in Montreal are two Old Montreal walks and a ghost walk at $25.33 each, the median across the 33 tours with a published price is $70.74, and the most expensive is a 3-hour private car tour of Montreal at $209.55. The Ottawa day lands almost exactly on the median, which is fair value for a 12-hour round trip with a guide.

Comparing like with like among the day trips helps. The Mont-Tremblant one day trip is also $71.66 but runs 8 hours 30 minutes instead of 12. The Eastern Townships day trip is $180.96 for 9 hours, though it carries hotel pickup and a small group of at most 12. The Quebec City days range from $45 on the Agence Wonder Travel bus to $133.91 on the full-day version with a sightseeing cruise. Ottawa is neither the cheapest nor the dearest: it is the middle option.

Hidden costs are few but real. Lunch is the main one, and a market lunch in the capital is priced like any city-centre meal, so treat it as a normal restaurant spend rather than a tour extra. Tipping is already covered on this tour, which removes the usual end-of-tour calculation. Quebec sales tax, GST at 5 percent and QST at 9.975 percent, may or may not be baked into a tour price depending on the operator; the tour page shows what the price includes rather than requiring you to compute totals.

A useful mental model is cost per hour of guided day. The Ottawa trip at $71.66 across 12 hours works out cheaper per hour than the Eastern Townships at $180.96 across 9 hours, though the Townships day buys a smaller group and hotel pickup. Per-hour arithmetic flatters long coach days, because much of the day is riding, but it does show that the Ottawa price is not inflated for the hours involved.

What Do You See In Ottawa On A Guided Day Tour?

A guided Ottawa day from Montreal centres on Parliament Hill and the ByWard Market, the two stops the itinerary names, with admission to both listed as not included and free time to explore. Expect a walking-paced visit, not a museum marathon.

Parliament Hill is the headline. The Parliament buildings sit above the Ottawa River, and the Parliamentary tours of the Senate of Canada Building and the House of Commons at West Block are the structured way inside. If you want that tour, book it through the Parliament's own site before your travel date and bring government photo ID, which is required for West Block. The guided coach day does not arrange it for you, so book ahead rather than on the bus.

The ByWard Market is the second named stop. Since lunch is not included on the tour, the market is where most travellers eat. It is also the natural place to spend whatever free time the day allows, browsing the stalls or simply sitting with a coffee between sights.

Beyond those two anchors, the day's sightseeing depends on the guide and the season. Twelve hours sounds generous, but subtract the two coach legs and what remains is a substantial yet finite block of capital time, so arriving with one or two priorities beats trying to see everything.

Weather and season change the picture. In warm months the market spills outdoors and the river pathways are at their best; in cold months the capital is quieter and indoor priorities, the Parliamentary interiors above all, carry the day. Either way, comfortable walking shoes matter more than on the Quebec City coach days, where the vehicle covers more ground between stops.

How Does The Ottawa Trip Compare With Other Montreal Day Trips?

Ottawa competes with three other guided day trips from Montreal: Quebec City at $45 to $133.91 for 13 to 14 hours, Mont-Tremblant at $71.66 for 8 hours 30 minutes and the Eastern Townships at $180.96 for 9 hours with hotel pickup. Ottawa is the only day trip reaching the national capital, and it is one of the Concord days with gratuities included in the price.

The four categories split cleanly by what you want from the day. Quebec City is the heavyweight: the Historic District of Old Quebec has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1985 and was the capital of New France, and four separate tours cover it, the most reviewed being the Coach Canada day trip at 4.2 across 2,568 reviews. The Quebec City day trip from Montreal guide covers those options in detail.

Mont-Tremblant is the short one. At 8 hours 30 minutes it is the shortest of the long day trips, from $71.66, with the panoramic gondola and Sentier des cimes entry not included unless you select that option. The resort sells 2026/27 season passes and has a Versant Soleil expansion opening from winter 2026/27, per tremblant.ca. It suits travellers who want mountains over monuments.

The Eastern Townships day trip is the premium small-group option: $180.96, 9 hours, at most 12 guests, complimentary pickup and drop-off from listed downtown Montreal hotels. The region calls itself the first wine region of Quebec, with the Route des vins de Brome-Missisquoi and the Route des vins de l'Estrie, per easterntownships.org, though the tour itself is a commented drive with short walks, not a tasting itinerary.

The Mont-Tremblant one day trip keeps the same $71.66 price as the Ottawa day with three and a half fewer hours on the clock.

For a different scale of day, the Eastern Townships trip trades the coach crowd for a group of at most 12 and a hotel pickup, at more than double the price.

And the featured Quebec City and Montmorency Falls full day trip, from $83.24 and rated 4.5 across 355 reviews, pairs the UNESCO-listed old city with the falls and a one-way cable car ride when the cable car is available.

A simple rule of thumb closes the comparison. Choose Ottawa for the capital and its institutions, Quebec City for history and the biggest destination, Mont-Tremblant for a shorter mountain day and the Eastern Townships for a small-group countryside drive. Two of the four carry hotel pickup; the Ottawa day does not state it, which is the one planning difference worth flagging twice.

A few line items sit outside the ticket prices. On the Ottawa day, Parliament Hill and ByWard Market admission plus meals are extra, so budget beyond the $71.66. The $45 Quebec City & Montmorency Falls 1 Day Tour leaves Montmorency Falls admission off the ticket, and food and drinks are excluded on the Eastern Townships and Quebec City and Montmorency Falls departures, so plan for lunch on the road.

Group caps range from 12 to 99, a spread that works in Ottawa's favour: its cap of 50 is the second smallest of the five, with only the 12-guest Eastern Townships day lower. Mont-Tremblant allows 55, while the Quebec City and Montmorency Falls Day Trip runs to 99. Hotel pickup appears on just two rows of the table, the Eastern Townships day, with its listed downtown Montreal hotels, and that same Quebec City and Montmorency Falls Day Trip.

Quebec City buyers get two table entries plus the featured trip. The $45 Quebec City & Montmorency Falls 1 Day Tour runs 14 hours, caps at 55 and leaves Montmorency Falls admission out.

What Should You Know Before Booking The Ottawa Day Tour?

Book the Ottawa City One Day Tour with three things in mind: the 7:00 am meeting at 99 Avenue Viger Ouest means an early start, meals and Ottawa admissions are your own costs, and the free cancellation wording is a full refund up to 24 hours before the start. The review pool is small at 12, so judge the tour on its itinerary. Bring photo ID if you book a Parliament tour yourself.

The meeting point is fixed: 99 Avenue Viger Ouest, the same departure address Concord uses for its Quebec City, Tremblant and sugar shack days. Nothing about hotel pickup is stated for this tour, so plan to make your own way there for about 7:00 am. Montreal's metro and buses run from early morning; a single Zone A trip with transfer and a 24-hour pass are the usual choices, and current prices are on the official fares page, useful if you are staying beyond walking distance of the departure point.

Weather shapes the day. A day built around Parliament Hill and an open-air market feels different in each season. The tour runs with a guide aboard the coach both ways, so the ride itself is part of the experience, with commentary in English and French.

Cancellation terms are favourable: a full refund up to 24 hours before the start, the standard wording on 35 of the 36 tours covered on this site. That gives you a day-before decision point if weather or plans shift. All sales being final applies to Notre-Dame Basilica tickets in Montreal, not to this tour.

One practical sequence works well: book the coach day first, then immediately book the Parliament tour for the matching afternoon through the Parliament site, then leave the ByWard Market for lunch and the remaining free time. That order turns the two not-included admissions into planned highlights rather than missed ones. It also front-loads the two things that can sell out or fill up, leaving nothing to arrange on the morning itself beyond arriving on time.

For travellers based in Toronto rather than Montreal, the logistics of reaching Montreal first are covered in the Montreal tours from Toronto guide. For everyone else, the decision usually comes down to Ottawa versus Quebec City, and the Montreal city tour or Quebec City day trip comparison frames that choice, with Montreal Canada Tours covering both options across the site.

Common Questions About Ottawa Day Trips From Montreal