Asheville or Fort Myers?

There is no contest here. Asheville is hours from any sea, so swimming means cold waterfall pools in Pisgah, the rock slide at Sliding Rock, tubing on the French Broad or the small sandy beach at Lake Lure. That makes a good hot afternoon, not a beach vacation.

Fort Myers has the Gulf within an hour's drive. There is wide pale sand on Estero Island, quieter beaches at Lovers Key and Bonita, and shelling on Sanibel and Captiva. The water is shallow and gentle, warm in summer and cool but swimmable in winter, though algae blooms sometimes spoil it for a while.

Asheville eats and drinks far better for its size. Breweries fill downtown, the South Slope and West Asheville, and chef-driven kitchens cook from Appalachian farms: trout, heirloom beans, foraged ramps, barbecue and biscuits. The WNC Farmers Market shows where it all comes from.

Fort Myers is about a simple seafood meal by the water: grouper sandwiches, peel-and-eat shrimp and stone crab in season. There are a few independent restaurants and breweries in the River District and many highway chains elsewhere. Neither has much international range, but only Asheville is worth planning meals around.

Both cities have a famous rich man's house as their main sight, but Asheville goes much further. The Biltmore Estate fills a full day on its own. The Art Deco and Beaux-Arts downtown, the Basilica of St Lawrence, the Thomas Wolfe Memorial and the Folk Art Center stretch a visit to two or three days.

The Edison and Ford Winter Estates in Fort Myers make a rewarding half day among the laboratory and gardens. After that come palm-lined McGregor Boulevard, a few brick streets downtown and small local museums, and most visitors are done in a day.

Neither is a late-night city, but Asheville makes the better evening. Taprooms, cocktail bars and dives sit within walking distance of each other downtown and on the South Slope. Haywood Road in West Asheville has a local crowd, and the drum circle in Pritchard Park livens up summer Fridays.

Fort Myers splits its evenings between a few bars in the River District, which get busier on the monthly art walk, and the beach bars by the pier on Estero Island, where sunset draws the crowd. Winter brings an older crowd and early nights, and March brings spring-breakers.

Both are outdoor destinations of very different kinds, and Asheville has the bigger, more varied landscape. Pisgah National Forest, the Blue Ridge Parkway, Mount Mitchell and the Great Smoky Mountains offer waterfall walks, ridge hikes over Max Patch, serious mountain biking and whitewater on the Nantahala and Pigeon rivers. Spring blossom and October colour add to the appeal.

Fort Myers is flat country of mangrove and cypress, and its strength is wildlife rather than exercise. You can watch spoonbills and herons at Ding Darling, walk the boardwalk at Corkscrew Swamp, kayak the Great Calusa Blueway and see manatees on the Orange River in winter. Summer there brings heat and mosquitoes.

Neither has a major city within easy reach, so the excursions are of similar weight, but they differ in kind. From Asheville you head into the mountains and small towns: Brevard's waterfall country, Black Mountain, the Carl Sandburg Home at Flat Rock and, the most rewarding of them, the Cherokee museum and Oconaluftee village.

From Fort Myers the trips follow the coast. There is polished Naples, the island villages of Sanibel, Captiva and Boca Grande, and the Koreshan settlement. Sarasota's Ringling museum and Ca' d'Zan make the richest cultural day. Both lists need a car.

Fort Myers is the easier family choice, especially with young children. The calm, shallow Gulf, shell hunting on Sanibel, dolphin and manatee spotting and the Shell Factory's animal park fill the days without much planning. Spring-training baseball adds a relaxed outing in March.

Asheville suits older, active children better. They have the Nature Center's bears and red wolves, Sliding Rock, river tubing, zip lines and the Biltmore farmyard. Neither city has a theme park close by, and both mean plenty of driving.

You will want a car in both, but Asheville gives you more on foot. Its compact downtown, hilly in places, connects easily with the South Slope and the River Arts District, so a day without driving is perfectly possible.

Fort Myers is spread across a low-density county. The only walkable streets are in the River District, and a trolley runs along Fort Myers Beach. Winter traffic on the bridges to the beaches and Sanibel backs up badly, while Asheville's slow spots are the scenic roads on October weekends.

Asheville is the better place to buy something to take home. Potters, glassblowers, weavers and woodworkers sell from galleries downtown and from studios in the River Arts District. The Folk Art Center and the boutiques of the Grove Arcade add more.

Shopping in Fort Myers is mostly outlets and open-air centres along the highway, good for bargains rather than browsing. There are also shell shops and galleries on Sanibel's Periwinkle Way and in Captiva. Neither is a fashion destination.

The two cost much the same, roughly what any American tourist town costs, with tips on meals and a hire car on top. The difference is in timing. Asheville is dearest on autumn weekends in leaf season, Biltmore is a pricey day out, and midweek and winter stays are easier.

Fort Myers is most expensive from about January to April, when rooms on Sanibel and Fort Myers Beach book up early, and much cheaper in summer. Staying inland near the interstate saves money at any time of year. In both, the best things cost little: trails and waterfalls in one, beaches and reserves in the other.

Asheville's music is the stronger draw, and it belongs to the place. Bluegrass and old-time jams happen in pubs and on porches, buskers play downtown, and Shindig on the Green brings free fiddle music and clogging on summer evenings. The Mountain Dance and Folk Festival has run since 1928, and touring rock, indie and Americana acts play its venues most nights of the year.

Fort Myers is more conventional and keeps to the winter season. Touring Broadway musicals and big-name shows come to the Barbara B. Mann hall, a repertory company plays a restored 1908 theatre downtown, and a regional symphony gives concerts, so a winter visitor after a night at a musical is well served. In summer the programme largely stops, leaving bands in beach bars and downtown pubs.

Asheville has a real tradition of rest, going back to the nineteenth-century health seekers who came for the mountain air. Today that means yoga studios, retreats, massage, large spas at the hillside resort hotels and the riverside mineral tubs at Hot Springs, under an hour away.

Fort Myers relaxes in a different way, through the slow pace of Sanibel and Captiva, pools, bike paths and walks along the water. Its spas are inside resort hotels, and it has no bathing tradition to seek out.