Atlanta or Clearwater?

There is no real contest here. Atlanta is hours from either coast, so swimming means a hotel pool or a summer weekend at Lake Lanier or Lake Allatoona. Their sandy swimming areas suit local families better than visitors.

Clearwater is built around its beach. It has fine white sand on a barrier island and shallow Gulf water you can wade far into. When Pier 60 feels crowded, Sand Key, Caladesi Island and Honeymoon Island have quieter stretches. From late spring well into autumn the sea is warm enough for long swims.

Atlanta is the place to eat. Its Southern cooking has real depth, from meat-and-three cafeterias and west-side soul food kitchens to barbecue and a serious Sunday brunch. Buford Highway adds Korean, Vietnamese, Ethiopian and Mexican kitchens that cook for the communities living there, though you will need a car or a ride for much of it.

Clearwater keeps things simple: a grouper sandwich at a dockside grill, stone crab in season and a drink on a beach deck at sunset. Beyond that the beachfront leans on chain restaurants. The best meals nearby are at the Greek tavernas of Tarpon Springs or across the bay.

Atlanta has two or three full days of sights with real weight. Above all there are the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park and the National Center for Civil and Human Rights, and the High Museum of Art and the Atlanta History Center add more. Little old townscape survived the fire of 1864, so this is sightseeing in museums and memorials rather than wandering old streets.

Clearwater has a restored 1920s theatre and some early twentieth-century buildings downtown, but nothing to plan a day around. For culture, its visitors go to the Dalí Museum in St Petersburg or to Ybor City in Tampa.

Atlanta's nightlife is known across the country. It has big clubs playing the hip-hop and trap the city is famous for, dive bars along Edgewood Avenue, one of the South's largest LGBTQ scenes in Midtown and dressier lounges in Buckhead. Each area is a separate pocket, so plan on taking a ride between them.

In Clearwater, the evening starts with the sunset at Pier 60 and carries on at tiki decks with cover bands by the water. Spring brings a younger, louder crowd. For clubs and late dancing, though, people go to Ybor City or downtown St Petersburg.

Both cities offer a fair amount outdoors, but of opposite kinds. Atlanta's is green and hilly: a deep tree canopy, the granite dome of Stone Mountain, Kennesaw's battlefield trails and river floats on the Chattahoochee. About two hours north are the Blue Ridge foothills and the southern end of the Appalachian Trail.

Clearwater is flat and watery. You can kayak through mangrove channels, watch dolphins in the harbour or see manatees in winter, and walk shorebird trails on Caladesi and Honeymoon islands. Choose Atlanta for hiking and Clearwater for paddling and wildlife on the water.

Clearwater has the slightly better set of outings, largely because its neighbours supply what the town itself lacks. There is the Dalí Museum in St Petersburg, the old cigar factories of Ybor City in Tampa, the Greek sponge docks of Tarpon Springs and the Ringling Museum in Sarasota, with Orlando's theme parks a longer drive.

Atlanta's nearby trips are to pleasant small towns rather than famous sights: Athens with its music history, Dahlonega's gold-rush square and the antebellum houses of Madison. Chattanooga's aquarium and Lookout Mountain are two hours north. Both cities need a car for all of this.

Clearwater has the edge with young children, because its main attraction is free and gentle. The water is calm and shallow, with lifeguards at Pier 60, and there is a marine rescue aquarium, dolphin-watching boats and Busch Gardens within forty minutes. Condos with pools and kitchens make longer stays easy.

Atlanta has plenty for children, including the Georgia Aquarium's whale sharks, Zoo Atlanta's gorillas, Fernbank's dinosaurs and the Center for Puppetry Arts. But traffic and driving break up the days, and summer is sticky. Spring and autumn suit both places best with small children.

Both are car country, but the parts you can manage without a car differ. In Atlanta, the MARTA rail line runs from the airport through downtown and Midtown to Buckhead, and the BeltLine's Eastside Trail links several neighbourhoods on foot or by bike. The rest of the wide metro area needs a car or a ride.

In Clearwater you can get by on foot along the beach strip, with a trolley to Sand Key and a ferry to downtown. Every trip off the island, from the state parks to Tampa, means driving over a causeway that backs up on busy weekends.

Atlanta is the better place to shop, though mostly in malls. The two big centres face each other on Peachtree Road in Buckhead, with designer boutiques nearby, and Little Five Points adds vintage clothing and record shops for contrast.

Clearwater offers beachwear, souvenirs and big-box stores on the mainland. Its most local thing to take home is a natural sponge from Tarpon Springs. Neither city has a craft tradition worth travelling for.

Neither is a cheap destination, and both add tax and tips to every meal. Atlanta's hotels outside Buckhead cost noticeably less than on either coast, and the civil rights sites are free, though car hire and tickets to the big attractions add up.

In Clearwater, costs follow the seasons. Beachfront rooms are dearest in the late winter and spring peak. Summer, motels on the mainland and condos with kitchens bring the bill down, and the beach itself costs nothing but parking.

Atlanta has a full set of resident companies: the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra at the Woodruff Arts Center, the Alliance Theatre, the opera and the ballet, with touring Broadway shows at the Fox Theatre. Its popular music is just as strong, with major hip-hop, R&B and gospel tours and mid-sized halls such as the Tabernacle.

Clearwater relies on two venues: Ruth Eckerd Hall for touring acts and the intimate Capitol Theatre. Beach bars add nightly cover bands. For opera or ballet, you drive to Tampa.

Clearwater is the more restful of the two. That is not because of its spas, which are ordinary resort treatment rooms, but because of its pace: few sights, nothing that needs an early start, and pool days and evenings by the marina.

Atlanta's best offer is unusual: large Korean bathhouses in the northeastern suburbs, with hot and cold pools and sauna rooms. Outside them, the traffic and sprawl keep the rest of the trip far from slow.