Alta, Utah or Salt Lake City?

Neither place is about the water, but Salt Lake City at least gives you somewhere to swim. You can float without effort in the brine off Antelope Island, and on a hot July day the Wasatch reservoirs such as Jordanelle, Deer Creek and Pineview have paddleboards, boats and patches of sandy shore.

In Alta, swimming means a lodge pool or a hot tub, and the Great Salt Lake far below is not a lake anyone swims in.

Alta's food is fuel for skiers. Dinner is usually included with the room and eaten at long shared tables, lunch comes from the slopeside cafeterias, and there is no restaurant street, no market and nowhere to drop in for coffee.

Salt Lake City offers far more choice. The best meals come from the Mexican, Pacific Islander, Peruvian and Vietnamese kitchens along State Street, there are local oddities such as fry sauce and fried scones, and Sugar House has breweries and coffee roasters. Utah's liquor rules shape the drinking in both places.

Salt Lake City has a proper set of sights, centred on its founding faith: the granite temple, the domed Tabernacle and the gardens of Temple Square, then the Beehive House, the State Capitol, the painted Cathedral of the Madeleine and the Natural History Museum. Two days covers it, but there is real substance.

Alta's past as a silver-mining camp survives only as old workings on the ski slopes. Anyone staying up the canyon who wants a museum drives down to the city.

In Alta the night ends with one drink in a lodge bar and an early bed, and regulars like it that way. Salt Lake City offers a little more: bars and breweries downtown and in the Granary District, a few dance clubs, a long-standing gay scene and neighbourhood pubs in Sugar House. It is still an early, restrained city shaped by the state's liquor laws, but it gives you a choice of places to go out, which Alta does not.

Both give you the same famous Wasatch powder, but from different positions. Alta sits in it at about 2,600m, where the snow falls deepest and the steep terrain and backcountry bowls start from the lodge door. In summer Albion Basin's wildflowers and the walk to Cecret Lake are right outside, with moose and mountain goats on the trails.

Salt Lake City covers a wider range. All four canyon resorts and Park City's ski areas are within reach, foothill trails begin above the Avenues, and to the west the land changes completely, with bison on Antelope Island and the white expanse of the Bonneville Salt Flats.

From Alta, a day out means a complete change of scene. Salt Lake City is under an hour down the canyon, with Temple Square, the Capitol and the museums, and Park City's mining-era Main Street and Ogden's old railway street are also within reach. The catch is the single canyon road, which can close after storms.

Salt Lake City's own outings are a little thinner by comparison: Park City over the ridge, Heber and Swiss-flavoured Midway, Ogden's 25th Street and the longer drive to the Golden Spike site. From either place the national parks in the south need an overnight stay.

Salt Lake City is one of the easier American cities to visit with children. Hogle Zoo, the Living Planet Aquarium, Discovery Gateway, the planetarium and Tracy Aviary are all in the valley, Lagoon is twenty minutes north, and restaurants expect large families. You will need a car to link them up.

Alta suits only families who ski. Its ski school and gentle runs near the base are good, but there is little else for children, the altitude can tire them, and storms sometimes keep everyone indoors.

Salt Lake City is somewhat easier to get around. TRAX light rail runs from the airport to downtown and the University, FrontRunner trains reach Ogden and Provo, and the grid of addresses counted from Temple Square is easy to learn, although the long blocks and the spread of the valley still make a car useful.

Alta is easy once you are there, with lodges at the lifts and a winter shuttle, but everything depends on the one road up Little Cottonwood Canyon. It backs up on powder mornings, closes for avalanche control and often requires chains.

Salt Lake City has practical shopping: City Creek Center's open-air mall with a creek running through it, the old streetcar barns of Trolley Square, and independent and vintage shops around 9th and 9th and in Sugar House. Its outdoor-equipment shops are especially good. Alta has rental counters, ski tuning and branded souvenirs, so if you need a new jacket or a gift, you will be shopping in the city.

Salt Lake City is the more affordable of the two. Downtown hotels are reasonably priced, everything on Temple Square is free, and light rail costs little.

Alta has only a handful of lodges, and with dinner usually included they come at high rates in season, with almost no budget beds anywhere up the canyon. That is why many cost-conscious skiers stay in the valley and take the ski bus up, which keeps the same snow within reach.

Here the gap is complete. Salt Lake City has the Tabernacle Choir, whose rehearsals and broadcasts in the Tabernacle are open to the public, as well as organ recitals on Temple Square, the Utah Symphony at Abravanel Hall, Utah Opera, Ballet West and touring shows at the Eccles Theater.

Alta has no stage of any kind. Evenings there are spent in the lodge, and the nearest concert is down in the city.

Both offer modest, restful pleasures rather than a spa vacation, but of different kinds. In Alta you get an outdoor hot tub steaming in the snow, a small lodge spa and a deep village quiet after a hard day on the slopes.

Salt Lake City's distinctive option is natural warm water, which Alta lacks. You can soak in the warm mineral water of the Homestead Crater in Midway, inside its limestone dome, and there are smaller hot springs nearby, alongside the larger resort spas in Park City.