Asheville or Lake George?

Asheville is a mountain city several hours from any coast. Swimming there means chilly waterfall pools in Pisgah, the rock slide at Sliding Rock, tubing on the French Broad and a small sandy beach on Lake Lure. These make pleasant summer half-days, but they are not a beach vacation.

Lake George puts swimming at the centre of a summer stay. The broad state beach at the south end of the village has lifeguards and mountain views, and Shepard Park and Bolton Landing have smaller beaches. You can also swim from a boat or the islands in the Narrows. The season is short, though, running only from late June to early September.

Asheville is far ahead at the table. Dozens of breweries cluster downtown, on the South Slope and in West Asheville, and the kitchens cook from Appalachian farms: trout, heirloom beans, ramps, barbecue and biscuits. The farmers' markets, cider and mead add to it. Beyond Southern and American cooking there is little international choice, and the best places fill up at weekends.

Lake George mostly serves summer resort food: pizza, pancakes, ice cream and waterfront decks where the view matters more than the cooking. A few dining rooms at Bolton Landing and the shore hotels serve Adirondack game and lake fish, but serious eaters tend to drive to Saratoga Springs for dinner.

Asheville has two strong sights: the Biltmore Estate, America's largest private house with Olmsted gardens, and a downtown of intact Art Deco and Beaux-Arts buildings such as City Hall and the Grove Arcade. The art museum, the Thomas Wolfe Memorial and the Folk Art Center fill out two or three days.

Lake George has one real sight, the reconstructed Fort William Henry with its 1757 siege story and musket demonstrations, plus a small historical museum. Beyond those, the village is mostly motels and arcades.

Neither place is built for a late night, but Asheville gives you more to do after dinner. Taprooms, cocktail bars and dive bars sit within walking distance of each other downtown and on the South Slope. Haywood Road has a more local crowd, and there is a long-standing LGBTQ scene.

Lake George's evenings are the summer-weekend bars on Canada Street and the waterfront, full of boaters and day-trippers drinking beer on the decks. Out of season, and in the shore hamlets, everything goes quiet early.

Both are excellent bases for the outdoors, but the experience is different. Asheville is about land: the Blue Ridge Parkway, waterfall walks and ridge hikes in Pisgah, Mount Mitchell and the Great Smokies an hour away, top-class mountain biking and whitewater rafting on the Nantahala and Pigeon rivers.

At Lake George the water comes first. You kayak, sail and fish among more than a hundred islands, and the Narrows are the loveliest stretch. Prospect Mountain, Black Mountain and Tongue Mountain give the big views. Winter is stronger here too, with Gore Mountain's large ski area about an hour away and ice fishing on the frozen lake, where Asheville offers only small slopes.

Lake George has the stronger list of day trips. Saratoga Springs, under an hour away, combines a spa town, a historic racecourse and a Revolutionary War battlefield. Fort Ticonderoga sits above Lake Champlain, Lake Placid is within reach, and Vermont's New England towns make a scenic drive east.

From Asheville, most outings are into the scenery rather than to other towns. The best are the Cherokee museum and the Oconaluftee village, the waterfall country around Brevard, Carl Sandburg's home at Flat Rock and Greenville's riverside downtown about an hour away.

Lake George was built as a family summer resort, and it shows. The Great Escape and its water park are a short drive away, the state beach slopes gently into calm water, and there are steamboat cruises, mini golf and arcades on Canada Street. You can choose from plenty of motels with pools and cottages with kitchens. The catch is that most of it shuts outside summer.

Asheville suits active children better than young ones. It has the bears and red wolves at the nature centre, tubing, Sliding Rock, zip lines and the Biltmore farmyard. There are no big rides or attractions close by, though, and Dollywood is two hours away over the mountains.

You need a car in both places, but Asheville gives you more to do on foot. The hilly downtown, the South Slope breweries and the River Arts District are close enough to walk between or take a short ride. A limited bus network covers part of the city, but Biltmore, the Parkway and the trailheads all need a car.

In Lake George you can walk from the pier to the fort in a few minutes, and seasonal trolleys run to Glens Falls and the outlets. Everything else is a drive, and summer parking in the village is a headache. A rented boat is the best way to see the lake.

Asheville is the place for handmade things. Pottery, glass, weaving and woodwork fill the downtown galleries and the working studios of the River Arts District, and the Folk Art Center and the Grove Arcade's boutiques add to the choice.

Lake George mostly sells souvenirs, fudge and beachwear on Canada Street, with outlet centres down Route 9. If you want a local gift, look for the few shops selling maple syrup, balsam pillows or rustic Adirondack furniture.

The two cost about the same, and both are expensive at their peak. In Asheville the pressure comes on autumn weekends in leaf season, and the Biltmore ticket and a hire car add to the bill. At Lake George, July and August weekends are the costly ones, with boat rentals and theme park tickets adding up for families.

Both have ways to save. Asheville's trails, waterfalls and Parkway cost nothing, and midweek or winter stays are cheaper. At Lake George, the older Route 9 motels, cottages with kitchens, rooms in Glens Falls and stays after the leaves fall all keep costs down.

Asheville has live music all year. Touring Americana and indie acts play its downtown venues, and bluegrass and old-time jams run in pubs and on porches. Shindig on the Green and the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival, held since 1928, carry the Appalachian tradition.

Lake George's performances are almost all in summer. There are free concerts by the water in Shepard Park, a September jazz weekend and an August chamber music festival. For major orchestras and big shows, people drive to the amphitheatre in Saratoga Springs.

Asheville's reputation for rest goes back to its nineteenth-century health-resort days. Today it has retreats, yoga studios, the spas of the hillside resort hotels and riverside mineral tubs at Hot Springs, about forty minutes away.

At Lake George, you have to get away from the village to find calm. The resort spas near Bolton Landing and quiet mornings in a shoreline cottage do the job, and Saratoga's historic mineral baths are under an hour away. In midsummer the arcades and traffic make the village itself anything but restful.