Anchorage or Vancouver?

Anchorage has no beach life to speak of. Cook Inlet is silty, icy and edged with treacherous mudflats, so the only summer swimming is a short season at city lakes such as Goose Lake and Jewel Lake.

Vancouver's shoreline is part of daily life in summer, from English Bay and its sunsets to the long sand of Kitsilano, Jericho and Spanish Banks. The water is still cold, so think of picnics, volleyball and a quick dip, or the heated saltwater pool at Kitsilano, rather than a beach vacation.

Both cities cook from the same northern Pacific waters, so salmon, halibut, crab and spot prawns are the highlights in either. In Anchorage that is most of the story, with reindeer sausage from carts, brewery taprooms in Spenard and midtown, and otherwise diners and family restaurants.

Vancouver adds the depth Anchorage lacks. Its Cantonese dim sum and seafood halls, especially out in Richmond, are among the best outside Asia, and sushi, ramen and Korean barbecue are everywhere. Granville Island's market and the cafés and breweries of Main Street and Commercial Drive make eating out a reason to visit, not just a necessity.

Both are young cities where the strongest thread is Indigenous art and history. Anchorage tells the Alaskan story through the Anchorage Museum and the Alaska Native Heritage Center, with dance and traditional dwellings, plus floatplanes at Lake Hood and the aviation museum beside it.

Vancouver offers a little more to wander through. The Museum of Anthropology's hall of Northwest Coast totem poles is the finest single sight in either city, and Gastown's cobbles, the Dr Sun Yat-Sen Garden in Chinatown and Emily Carr at the Vancouver Art Gallery add some texture. Two or three days covers either.

Neither city is a place for big nights, but Vancouver gives more choice. Anchorage means pubs, dive bars and taprooms spread between downtown and Spenard Road, lively under the summer midnight sun and very quiet in the winter dark.

Vancouver has cocktail and wine bars in Gastown's brick warehouses, summer patios in Yaletown and Kitsilano, a proper club strip on Granville Street at weekends and the gay bars of Davie Village. It is still an early-to-bed city, just with more options before bedtime.

Both have exceptional wild country on the doorstep, but of different kinds. Anchorage is rawer and more subarctic: the Chugach rise behind the suburbs, moose roam the neighbourhoods, and the drive along Turnagain Arm leads to beluga whales, the tidal bore and glaciers at Portage, with northern lights in winter.

Vancouver is greener, gentler and easier to reach without a car. Stanley Park's cedar forest and the seawall are in the city, the North Shore peaks offer trails and lit night skiing across the harbour, and the Sea-to-Sky Highway leads to Squamish's climbing walls and Whistler. Kayaking, orca watching and mild winters make it an all-year outdoor city.

Day trips from Anchorage are drives through scenery to small places: the ski village of Girdwood, Whittier through its single-lane tunnel, the spirit houses at Eklutna, the colony farm buildings of Palmer and the old gold camp at Independence Mine. Everything needs a car and time on the road.

Vancouver has one excursion of real substance in Victoria, with its harbour, Parliament Buildings and gardens, though the ferry makes it a long day. Steveston, Fort Langley and Bowen Island are easier half-day outings.

Vancouver is the easier family city. Stanley Park alone fills a day with the aquarium, a miniature train, playgrounds and a flat seawall for scooters, and Science World, the little False Creek ferries and the Grouse Mountain gondola are all close by on public transport.

Anchorage rewards outdoor-minded families with the Alaska Zoo's bears and musk oxen, moose and bison at the wildlife centre near Portage, and floatplanes at Lake Hood. But distances, the need for a car and bright summer nights that make bedtimes hard ask more of parents.

This is where the two differ most. Anchorage has a small, walkable downtown grid, then thinly served suburbs and wide roads, so almost every visitor hires a car, and winter driving on ice needs care.

Vancouver can be done without one. The SkyTrain runs from the airport to downtown, the SeaBus crosses to the North Shore and one card covers it all. The compact core and seawall are made for walking and cycling, and a car only helps for trips up the coast.

Anchorage's worthwhile buys are distinctly Alaskan: Alaska Native carvings, ulu knives and qiviut scarves from musk ox wool, plus the summer weekend market downtown. Beyond that it is malls, outdoor-gear stores and cruise-passenger souvenirs.

Vancouver has more range: chains and flagships on Robson Street, luxury on Alberni, artists' studios on Granville Island, independent and vintage shops in Gastown and Main Street, and Richmond's Asian malls. Its Northwest Coast prints and jewellery are the local equivalent of Anchorage's Native art.

Both are expensive, with summer hotel rates pushed up by cruise traffic. In Anchorage the costs are harder to avoid: food arrives by ship or plane, a rental car is close to essential, and glacier cruises and flightseeing are the main reason to come.

Vancouver offers more ways to economise. Noodle shops, dim sum and casual sushi are good and fairly cheap, transit replaces a car, and Stanley Park, the seawall and the beaches are free. In both, visiting outside summer brings room rates down.

Anchorage has a respectable programme for its size at the Alaska Center for the Performing Arts, home to its symphony and opera, but the season runs mainly in winter when visitors are few. Native dance and drumming at the Heritage Center is the most distinctive thing to see.

Vancouver's calendar peaks in summer, when most people visit. Bard on the Beach stages Shakespeare in Vanier Park with the mountains behind, and the Fringe and the jazz and folk festivals fill the season. The symphony plays in the ornate 1927 Orpheum.

Neither has a bathing tradition, and both rely on calm and setting. Anchorage offers hotel spas and a Nordic-style spa with outdoor pools in Girdwood, forty minutes away, along with quiet trails and uncrowded summer evenings.

Vancouver has more in town: a long-established yoga culture, good hotel day spas and many massage and reflexology places in Chinatown and Richmond. Its large outdoor spas are further out near Whistler, but a slow seawall walk is never far away.