Anaheim or Park City?

Only Anaheim has a real coast within reach. About half an hour's drive brings you to Huntington Beach's wide surf beach and pier, the harbour and Balboa Peninsula at Newport, or Laguna's small coves between rocky headlands. The Pacific stays cool, so wetsuits are common outside late summer, and you will need a car.

Park City has no sea at all. In high summer the nearest place to swim is Jordanelle Reservoir down the valley, which has sandy swimming areas and cool water for a short season. Most visitors' swimming happens in hotel pools and hot tubs.

Anaheim offers more variety, though you have to drive away from the parks to find it. Brookhurst Street's Little Arabia has Lebanese, Palestinian and Yemeni grills and sweet shops, and Little Saigon next door is known for pho and banh mi. Around the resort itself, the food is mostly counters and chains.

Park City is smaller and narrower but polished. Main Street and the resort bases serve elk, bison, trout and steaks, and après-ski with whiskey and craft beer is a ritual in itself. Cheaper meals often mean the chains at Kimball Junction.

Culture is not the reason to visit either place, and what each offers is different. Anaheim's real landmark is Disneyland, the only Disney park Walt Disney saw completed. Little else of the old citrus town survives, and the Bowers Museum and the Nixon Library are both a drive away.

In Park City the heritage is the town itself. Restored wooden storefronts climb Main Street, mine headframes stand on the slopes, and the Park City Museum tells the silver-mining story. The Olympic Park adds ski history. An afternoon covers it all.

Both are quiet after dark, in different ways. In Anaheim the night ends with the park fireworks, a drink on the promenade or in a central brewpub, or the stadium bars on hockey and baseball nights. Long Beach and Los Angeles are where the real nights out happen.

Park City's evenings start early, on slopeside decks as the lifts close, and then move to the saloons on Main Street. These get lively on winter weekends but are nearly asleep in summer. Salt Lake City is the fallback.

Park City is in another league here. Big ski areas rise straight from town at about 2,100m, the light Utah powder falls all winter, and in summer hundreds of kilometres of singletrack leave from the streets. Fly fishing on the Provo and Weber rivers and gold aspens in autumn complete the picture.

Anaheim's outdoors is pleasant rather than dramatic, and you need a car. There are chaparral trails in the Santa Ana Mountains and tide pools at Crystal Cove. What it has that Park City cannot match is whale-watching boats out of Newport and Dana Point.

Anaheim makes the far better base, provided you have a car and some patience with traffic. Hollywood and the Getty in Los Angeles, the Queen Mary in Long Beach, the ferry to Catalina, the mission at San Juan Capistrano and San Diego further down the coast are all in range.

From Park City, Salt Lake City and Temple Square are the main outing, with the Heber Valley steam railway, Swiss-style Midway and Ogden's railroad-era street close behind. After that the options are mostly scenery.

Anaheim is one of the world's great family destinations. Disneyland and Disney California Adventure stand side by side, Knott's Berry Farm is ten minutes away, and many families never leave that small area all week. The downsides are the queues and needing a car for anything further.

Park City is easy and safe with children, with good ski schools and free buses. The Olympic Park's alpine coaster and ziplines and the summer slides at the resort bases keep children busy. There is no theme park or aquarium in town, though, and the altitude can tire small children for the first day or two.

Park City is simpler without a car. Free buses link Old Town, Main Street, both ski bases and Kimball Junction, and parking is so awkward that leaving the car behind is the sensible choice. It gets harder beyond town: there is no rail, and the airport shuttle uses a canyon road that snow can slow down.

Anaheim works on foot only within the resort district, where shuttles connect the hotels to the parks. The rest of Orange County is built around freeways. Metrolink and Amtrak trains do run to Los Angeles and San Diego.

Anaheim has the bigger range, but almost all of it is in malls. Disney merchandise fills the resort, the huge luxury mall in Costa Mesa has most of the fashion houses, and outlet centres cover the middle of the market. You drive from one car park to the next.

Park City is smaller but more pleasant to browse on foot. Main Street has art galleries, cowboy-boot and Western-wear shops, outdoor gear and ski fashion, and Kimball Junction has outlets for the basics.

Neither is cheap, but Anaheim is easier on the budget. The big costs are park tickets and hotels by the gates. Chain motels a short drive away cost much less, and suburban restaurants and the Vietnamese and Middle Eastern districts charge normal local prices.

Park City sits at the top of the North American resort market in ski season, with costly lodging, lift tickets and ski school, and the Christmas weeks cost more still. Summer and autumn are much cheaper, and some visitors stay in Salt Lake City or the Heber Valley to save money.

Anaheim offers more, and it runs all year. Disney's water shows and stage musicals fill park evenings, and the Segerstrom Center in Costa Mesa has the Pacific Symphony, touring Broadway shows and ballet. The arena books major rock and pop tours.

Park City's programme is at its best in summer, when the Utah Symphony plays on the lawns at Deer Valley and free concerts fill the parks. The 1920s Egyptian Theatre on Main Street has comedy and cabaret all year.

Park City is much the more restful choice. The big lodges at Deer Valley and the Canyons have proper spas, and an outdoor hot tub in the snow comes with almost every stay. In Midway, the Homestead Crater lets you swim in warm spring water inside a limestone dome.

In Anaheim, early starts and park crowds leave little room to unwind. Hotel pools and suburban Korean-style day spas help, but to really slow down you drive to the clifftop resorts at Laguna Beach or Dana Point.