Aspen or Fort Collins?

Neither place is for a beach trip, and the swimming in each is quite different. Aspen's alpine lakes and reservoirs stay cold even in July, so the best water fun is floating the Roaring Fork on a raft or using a hotel pool.

Fort Collins has Horsetooth Reservoir, with a designated swim beach and coves full of paddleboards. Its water warms properly in high summer, so a swim there is more realistic, though the season is short.

Both eat well for their size but in very different registers. Aspen is about polished chef-led dining rooms, sushi and steak, deep wine lists and the après-ski ritual on slopeside terraces, with the June Food & Wine Classic as its showpiece. It has little cheap food, and many kitchens close in the quiet seasons.

Fort Collins is a drinking town first. Its long-established breweries and dense spread of taprooms are the draw, with gastropubs, tacos and food trucks alongside, but little fine dining. Choose Aspen for a special dinner and Fort Collins for a beer crawl.

Neither has major museums, and both are best for an easy wander through nineteenth-century brick. Aspen's silver-boom past shows in the Wheeler Opera House and the painted cottages of the West End, with the Aspen Art Museum and Herbert Bayer's Institute campus adding contemporary and modernist touches, and Ashcroft ghost town up the valley.

Fort Collins centres on its Old Town square and the Museum of Discovery, with Avery House and the university galleries filling a day. Its history is more ordinary small-city Victorian and Craftsman.

Both have a few streets of bars rather than a real club scene, but the crowds differ sharply. Aspen's nights are glossy and seasonal, with après-ski spilling into hotel bars and small clubs on peak winter weeks and the town going quiet in spring and autumn.

Fort Collins runs on students and beer: pubs, rooftop patios and taprooms around the main square, busiest on term-time weekends. It is cheaper and more casual, while Aspen is dressier and pricier.

Both are excellent bases for the outdoors, but Aspen is in a different league. It sits deep in the Elk Mountains at about 2,400m, with four ski mountains, backcountry huts, the Maroon Bells a short bus ride away and summits above 4,000m reachable on foot.

Fort Collins sits where the plains meet the foothills, with Horsetooth Mountain, Lory State Park and the wild Poudre Canyon close by, and Rocky Mountain National Park about an hour and a half away. Its riverside cycle trails are a plus, but winter offers no downhill skiing.

Fort Collins has the better choice of outings. Boulder beneath the Flatirons, Denver with its big museums, Estes Park, Golden and Cheyenne's frontier museum and capitol are all within roughly an hour or so by car, giving real variety.

Aspen's options are small mountain towns: Glenwood Springs, Carbondale, Redstone and Marble, plus Leadville over Independence Pass. When the pass closes in winter, the list shrinks further.

A family ski vacation points to Aspen. Buttermilk and Snowmass have gentle runs, well-run ski schools and dedicated kids' areas, and in summer the lifts lead up to alpine coasters and ropes courses. The altitude can leave small children tired for the first day or two.

Fort Collins suits a gentler, low-key stay, with playgrounds in every neighbourhood, the hands-on Museum of Discovery, farm animals at Lee Martinez Park and tubing on calm stretches of the river. Neither town has a zoo or theme park.

Aspen is far easier without a car. Its compact downtown grid is walkable in minutes, free buses link the four ski areas, and a shuttle runs to the Maroon Bells, though leaving the valley means mountain roads that storms can close.

Fort Collins is good by bike, with protected lanes and long off-street trails, and a rapid-bus line runs north to south. Beyond Old Town and the campus the suburbs sprawl, and the foothills and every day trip need a hire car.

Aspen offers far more for serious shoppers. Its pedestrian malls hold international luxury labels, high-end ski wear, jewellers and commercial art galleries, which is unusual for a mountain town, though there is little that is affordable.

Fort Collins is more modest: independent boutiques, bookshops, outdoor and cycling shops and vintage clothing in Old Town, plus chain retail on the highways. It is pleasant browsing rather than a reason to go.

The gap is enormous. Aspen prices rooms, lift tickets, ski school and meals for a very wealthy clientele, and even staying down the valley in Glenwood Springs only softens the cost.

Fort Collins is mid-priced for the country, with chain hotels, reasonable taprooms and free trails and river paths. The main extra cost is a hire car, and rooms rise on graduation and football weekends.

Aspen has the stronger stage, almost entirely thanks to summer. The Aspen Music Festival fills about eight weeks with orchestral, chamber and opera performances, many heard free from the lawn outside the Benedict Music Tent, and the ballet and Wheeler Opera House add to it.

Fort Collins runs on a steadier but smaller programme: touring Broadway and the local symphony at the Lincoln Center, university concerts and theatre in term time, and indie and bluegrass bands in Old Town bars.

Aspen is the better place to unwind. Its resort hotels have full spas with altitude-recovery treatments, the riverside paths are peaceful outside ski season, and the hot springs of Glenwood Springs and the hike-in pools at Conundrum are within reach.

Fort Collins has only ordinary day spas and yoga studios, with the nearest mineral soak well over an hour away. What it offers instead is a quiet, unhurried pace and shaded river walks.