we decided we would up and out, and stay at the tunnel mountain camp the next night, even if it isn’t so picturesque, because what is the use of pictureseque when you can’t leave the motorhome!! having not used the camping blocks, however, we did have a sani dump run to do, and that ended up a bit of a palava. it is the not so brill part of motorhoming, tho not too dreadful either as long as all goes smoothly. unfortunately it didn’t . DH got a bit stuck and had a wobbly moment, i went out to help and got bitten to pieces, but at least did manage to separate us from the inpipe, tho leaving a bit behind on the rv – well, so dh told me. arghing at yet another ‘thing’ we drove into banff for brekkie determined to enjoy the day. we were nearly there when dh had a ‘doh’ moment that the bit he had been trying to remove actually was part of the van – thank goodness i hadn’t been successful in removing that too!
the odd think about banff a about 9am is that it is pretty much deserted! the shops only open at 10, so despite worrying about parking, and parking somewhere that was 2 hours only, we would have been fine. dh moved the van afterwards to a more permanent spot near the boats 
. our idea was to grab an early all canadian breakfast. hmmmm, didn’t imagine the complete lack of places to do it! eventually we found somewhere called coyote that was really fab. sb had buttermilk and blueberry pancakes with roast potatoes and scrambled egg also on the plate!! bb had just buttermilk pancakes with maple syrup – we had ordered her just 1 as a childs portion, but after much wailing at that upgraded it to the adult three. she ate…. one, obviously DH and i chose diff things and had half each, a mediterannean omelette and burrito, with potato bravas and pancake of bb each! was far too much food and we were completely and utterly stuffed. yummy meal.
the girls and i then went to the parks canada info place and dh moved the van. unfortunately, though they could give us our banff explorer tag, they couldn’t give us the kootenay ones, so arranged to get that sent to our home – v v helpful these parks canada ppl. we then watche a screening on changing use of the parks – including a fab 70′s looking round a motorhome with wet and dry cabinets and the display on tracks and scats. v informative.
DH joined us and we walked along the riverfront to… the canoe hire! we hadn’t said anything about it to bb as didn’t want a repeat of the wailing at lake louise, but we hired 2 canoes for 2 hours at the same price it would have been for 1 there. bb was absolutely beside herself with utter happiness. the rest of us were also really happy we went bb and dh, sb and i. we told the young things that we were enthusiastic novices and needed to choose the quietest river route so they directed us up a slow sidestream to the vermillion lakes. it was perfect
I cannot put into words just how much i loved paddling along with sb, zigzagging up the creek, crashing into the riverside, ducking under the branches that we hadn’t avoided we didn’t ‘pull’ at the same strenght, and it took me a while to learn to pull and steer as it were 
dh had it easier, as bb pull didnt alter much the direction of the boat, and she was mostly enthusiastically splashing. and it was soooo peaceful . there weren’t too many canoe hirings, and many of them went up the river rather than our creek, so only occassionally did we have to alert others of the dangers of coming near us . we went under a railway bridge as a train went over – v exciting, and then finally paddled our way to the vermillion lakes. this was just so beautiful [and tranquil if you ignore us 
] and we had canoeing races, and sb and i tried to go backwards for a bit – and then we just revelled in the perfection of being on an empty lake reflecting the sky and the mountains.
we went back and got in just before our 2 hours were up, having thoroughly enjoyed it. i begin to really wish we lived on a lake or minor waterway so from the boats we had an icecream and enjoyed the sunshine and decided which of the museums to go to. we went to the banff park museum first. A bit odd as stuffed with stuffed animals, and SB got the unnerving thing, but bb quite happy looking around them. there was an interesting kids hands on bit as well. we then went ot the Luxton first nations museum which was very interesting, but a bit timewarped, and possibly could do with a bit of a refurb and rethink to make it sing to kids, especially when they are getting used to interactive elements everywhere. the tableaux were a bit unnerving – as sb pointed out, no one was smiling. i think it could have done with being a celebration of the culture a bit more perhaps, tho i completely get the need to catalogue how the coming of the pioneers changed things irrevocably. sb chose a wedding card for my cousins there, but neither chose to buy anything else. we went back into banff and the girls played at the park area until it was time to head off to a campsite and consider meal options
we went to the mountain tunnel site for motorhomes. it was kind of like a semigrassed carpark! however, no mosquitos and we could see the mountains. bb found a friend fairly swiftly, and she and they ran around looking for ground squirrels and leaping of bridges etc . after tea we then got into the motorhome and went for a drive. we drove to lake minnewanka, which is indeed v beautiful, and wandered about. not far along trails as lots of bears there, and then drove to johnson lake and finally some winding paths back to the campsite. we saw elk and bighorn sheep, and a wolf girls were both asleep, and we sat out with a beer for a bit before calling it a day. our last full day in the mountains.