There's an even better wave upstream near the Lachine neighborhood.
There is another one upstream from vague a guy (mavericks or something like that?), but it's a bit too sketchy for my liking.
I was one of the OG habitat kakayers, there was no surfers back then, none. I saw maybe 1-2 kayakers a month, usually the guys from the old riot factory, no one knew about it. I found it only because my friend happened to live at habitat.
To be honest once people found out about it and the surf school started it was ruined, I never go anymore, Big Joe is still empty though most of the time, you have to be nuts to bring a suft board way out there, I think in 5 years I saw maybe 3 surfers out there and 2 arrived by jet ski.
First time out I followed a Riot paddler who was keen to take me out as the rest of my crew didn't want to go. There was a massive thunderstorm and I noticed that everyone else had gone so I paddled back alone, riding the lightening.
Great times.
Yea it's not a practice that scales really well sadly. I usually go from like 7am - 11am so it's really chill and empty.
But very few "kooks" are interested in surfing them, survival instinct works pretty well.
(Seems weird to be talking about this stuff on HN, but fun.)