Alta, Utah or Phoenix?

Neither city has a beach. Alta is a mountain village, the Great Salt Lake below isn't for swimming, and in practice the water you get is a lodge pool or hot tub.

Phoenix does at least offer some swimming. The desert reservoirs east of the city, such as Saguaro Lake and Canyon Lake, have small beaches, tubing on the lower Salt River is a summer pastime, and big resort pools with lazy rivers fill the hot months.

Phoenix is clearly the better place to eat. Its Sonoran cooking is the draw: carne asada, paper-thin flour tortillas and bacon-wrapped hot dogs from evening carts. Add Southwestern dishes built on chiles and mesquite, and Scottsdale steakhouses for a more polished dinner. You usually have to drive to eat well.

In Alta, meals are mostly set dinners in the lodge dining rooms and lunch in the slopeside cafeterias, all filling food for skiers. If you want variety, you drive down the canyon to Salt Lake City, weather permitting.

Alta has almost nothing to visit beyond scattered traces of its silver-mining past on the slopes. It has no museums and no historic buildings, and its story is mostly about being one of the West's oldest ski areas.

Phoenix has real cultural pull, though it comes from museums rather than old streets. The Heard Museum's Native American collection, the Musical Instrument Museum and Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin West are each worth a half-day, and Pueblo Grande preserves Hohokam canal remains. You need the car to get between them.

There is no nightlife in Alta beyond a drink in the lodge bar after skiing, and regulars like it that way. Everyone is in bed early so they can be on the first lift.

Phoenix has real nights out, split across different districts. Old Town Scottsdale is for clubs and rooftop bars, Mill Avenue in Tempe runs on students, and Roosevelt Row has craft beer and cocktails with a local crowd. Bars close at 2am, and the distances mean you pick one district for the night.

Alta has the edge, and its landscape is the whole point of going. Little Cottonwood Canyon gets well over 12m of light powder in a big winter, with steep in-bounds terrain and serious backcountry. In summer Albion Basin turns into meadows of wildflowers, with trails up to Cecret Lake and Sugarloaf and moose on the paths.

Phoenix is still a strong outdoor city, with mountains starting at the edge of the suburbs. You can scramble up Camelback, ride South Mountain or walk through the McDowell Sonoran Preserve's saguaro forest, and Sedona's red rock is within reach. The catch is that this is a winter landscape. In summer the heat makes hiking dangerous after mid-morning.

Phoenix has the broader choice of day trips, as long as you drive. You can reach the hillside mining town of Jerome, the cliff dwelling at Montezuma Castle, red rock Sedona, or Tucson's adobe barrios and Mission San Xavier del Bac in under two hours.

From Alta the options are Salt Lake City's Temple Square and museums, Park City's old Main Street, and Ogden further north. Utah's national parks are much too far for a day. In winter the single canyon road can close after storms and leave you stuck in the village.

For most families, Phoenix is the easier choice. The zoo, the Arizona Science Center, a children's museum, the Scottsdale aquarium and the water parks cover plenty of days. Spring training games in March are a relaxed outing. Summer heat and long car journeys are the main drawbacks.

Alta only works for families who ski. It has a ski school, gentle slopes near the base and rooms close to the lifts, but nothing else built for children. The thin air at 2,600m and storm days spent indoors can be hard on young children.

Alta is the easier of the two once you have arrived. The lodges sit at the lifts, many are ski-in, ski-out, and a winter shuttle links the village. The difficult part is the drive up from Salt Lake City, about 50km away, on a canyon road that jams on powder mornings and closes for avalanche control.

In Phoenix you need a car almost all the time. The arterial roads run for dozens of kilometres, and the light rail is useful along its own corridor, which takes in the airport, downtown and Tempe, but buses are too slow to fill the gaps. You can walk in only a few small cores, such as Old Town Scottsdale, and summer heat makes even those walks hard work.

There is nothing to shop for in Alta beyond ski rental, gear and branded souvenirs.

Phoenix has a proper shopping scene. Scottsdale's luxury mall and the open-air centre near the Biltmore carry the international brands, Old Town has galleries and Western wear, and the buy to look for is Navajo and Zuni turquoise silver or Hopi carvings from a museum shop or a reputable gallery.

Phoenix is the cheaper trip, especially outside the busy January to April season, when resort rooms drop sharply. Freeway chain hotels are good value all year, Sonoran food is cheap and good, and the hiking is mostly free. Budget for a hire car.

Alta has only a handful of lodges, so beds are scarce and expensive in season, usually with dinner included. Lift tickets are fair by American standards. Skiers on a budget stay down in the Salt Lake valley and drive or take the bus up each morning.

Alta has no stage of any kind, and for a concert or a play you have to go down to Salt Lake City.

Phoenix has the full set of a large American city. There is the symphony at Symphony Hall, Arizona Opera and Ballet Arizona, and touring Broadway shows at Wright's round ASU Gammage in Tempe. The Musical Instrument Museum has an intimate concert hall. The seasons run from autumn to spring.

Phoenix is the better place for a restful stay. Scottsdale's large desert resorts below Camelback have full spas, several pools and treatments using sage, clay and agave, and the dry winter warmth makes a week by the pool easy. There are no public baths or hot springs, and the best of it costs resort money.

Alta's kind of rest is quieter and simpler. Its wellness means hot tubs steaming in the snow, saunas and massage in small lodge spas, and nights of complete silence after a day on the slopes. That suits tired skiers more than anyone looking for a spa vacation.