Adirondacks or Cape Cod?

The Cape has the sea and the Adirondacks do not, which settles it for most people who want a beach. Its range runs from open surf under the dune cliffs of the National Seashore to the gentle south shore at Falmouth and Harwich and the tide flats of Cape Cod Bay. The kettle ponds around Wellfleet add freshwater swimming.

The Adirondacks answer with lakes: the sandy public beaches of Lake George, Mirror Lake in Lake Placid and the docks of the Saranac and Fulton chains. The water is clear and just as warm in high summer, but there is no surf and much less variety. In both, swimming is really a July and August affair.

Seafood gives Cape Cod the edge. Wellfleet oysters, fried clams, lobster rolls and chowder at clam shacks and harbour-side tables in Chatham are worth seeking out. Provincetown adds a broader choice with a Portuguese influence.

The Adirondacks feed hikers rather than diners: pancakes with maple syrup, brewpubs, and steak or trout in log lodges. The best range is in Lake Placid and Saranac Lake, and the Champlain Valley adds cider and cheese in autumn. Neither is a place to travel to for the food.

Neither destination is a place for big museums, and their heritage differs in kind. The Adirondacks tell stories of war and wilderness: Fort Ticonderoga and Fort William Henry, the log-and-bark Great Camps, the Olympic venues of Lake Placid and the cure cottages of Saranac Lake.

Cape Cod's past lives in its villages, in the captains' houses and white churches along the Old King's Highway and in Provincetown's Pilgrim Monument and artists' colony. The Cape's sights sit closer together, so they fit between beach days more easily than the far-flung Adirondack forts and camps.

Cape Cod has a real night out and the Adirondacks barely do. In July and August, Provincetown fills Commercial Street with afternoon tea dances, gay and lesbian bars and dance clubs. Hyannis has a smaller strip of bars near the harbour.

In the mountains, evenings mean porches and campfires. Lake George village has summer bars and party boats at weekends, and Lake Placid has a few brewpubs. Everywhere else, the town tavern is the whole of it.

The Adirondacks are the bigger and wilder landscape. There are High Peaks rising to Mount Marcy at about 1,630m, thousands of lakes, and canoe trips lasting several days between lean-tos and portages. Add moose and loons, deep autumn colour, and skiing and ice climbing in winter.

Cape Cod's nature is gentler and coastal: the dunes of the Province Lands, salt marshes, cranberry bogs and short trails in the National Seashore. It stands out for wildlife at sea, with humpbacks at Stellwagen Bank and grey seals off Chatham. There is no high ground, though, and nothing on the Adirondacks' scale.

Cape Cod has the better outings, above all the ferries to Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, each a full day of whaling-town streets and captains' houses. Plymouth and New Bedford are close across the canal. Boston can be reached by road or, in summer, by sea from Provincetown.

From the Adirondacks, the good trips lie around the edges. Saratoga Springs and Albany are within reach of Lake George, the ferry crosses Lake Champlain to Burlington, and Montreal is a long day from the northern lakes. Inside the park, an outing usually means another lake or summit rather than another town.

Both are classic American family summers, and the Cape is slightly easier. Calm bay beaches and tide flats at Brewster, warm sound water at Falmouth, ponds and flat bike paths make for simple days, even though nothing there is built mainly for children.

The Adirondacks have more of those attractions: the theme park and water park near Lake George, the Wild Center's treetop walkway, the Olympic bobsled at Lake Placid and the Christmas village to the north. The price is long drives between them, and High Peaks trails are too steep for small legs.

You will want a car in both, since buses are too sparse to plan around. The difference is in the driving. In the Adirondacks the distances are long, on winding two-lane forest roads where Lake George to Lake Placid takes well over an hour and a half, but the roads are mostly quiet.

The Cape is compact, about an hour and a quarter from end to end, yet the canal bridges and main roads jam on summer weekends. It also offers more car-free options, with walkable Provincetown, the rail trail and summer ferries from Boston.

In both regions shopping is something you do between other things. The Adirondacks' most distinctive buys are rustic crafts, such as twig and bentwood furniture, pack baskets and balsam pillows, from craft shops and summer fairs. Beyond that, Lake Placid's Main Street offers outdoor gear and gifts, and Lake George has souvenirs and an outlet strip.

The Cape gives you more to browse. There are galleries in Provincetown and Wellfleet that grew out of the artists' colony, antique shops along the Old King's Highway, and tidy main streets of boutiques and bookshops in Chatham and Falmouth. Neither region is a place for fashion.

Neither is cheap in summer, but the Adirondacks are easier on the budget. Resort prices are concentrated in Lake Placid and along the shore of Lake George. The central and western lakes have family motels and state campgrounds, and the trails, lakes and summits cost nothing to use.

On the Cape, peak-season rentals often come by the week with minimum stays, and beach parking, ferries and seafood dinners add up. The plainer motels of the mid-Cape, clam-shack meals and the quieter months of June and September keep the cost down.

Summer is the season for live performance in both, but the stages differ in scale. The Adirondacks offer quieter fare: chamber music in lakeside churches, a summer opera programme for young singers near Schroon Lake and Lake Placid's arts centre. For anything bigger, the open-air amphitheatre at Saratoga Springs is an evening's drive from the southern lakes.

Cape Cod's season is fuller and closer to hand. The Cape Playhouse in Dennis is one of the country's oldest summer theatres, repertory companies work across the lower Cape and Hyannis has a tent theatre for touring acts. The Cape Cod Symphony also plays well beyond the summer.

Both places restore you through their pace rather than through spas. The Adirondacks feel a little more removed, with still lakes, canoeing at dawn and Saranac Lake's history as a mountain rest cure. Spa treatment is limited to a few grand resorts and lodges.

The Cape has more spas, yoga and massage, in Chatham, Brewster, Falmouth and Provincetown. However, July and August traffic can unsettle the calm, so it is most restful in September and early October.