Banff is a town in the Rocky Mountains in Alberta, in western Canada. People go there to ski, and also to walk by bright lakes and high peaks when the snow is gone. The town is small, but the national park around it is huge — Canada's oldest — so travellers often say "Banff" when they mean the park as well as the streets and hotels. Though actually, Canada did not invent the name. It was taken from a place in Scotland, and that Scottish name comes from Gaelic. The Gaelic may mean "piglet," or it may be "holy woman"; people who study names are not sure. In English you say it in one short sound, more like "Bamf" than "Ban-eff."