Atlantic City or Chattanooga?

This is Atlantic City's clear win. The broad, pale sand under the Boardwalk is free and patrolled by lifeguards, and it carries on south through Ventnor and Margate. By August the Atlantic is warm enough for long swims, though rip currents mean staying between the flags.

Chattanooga is far inland and its water is fresh: small swimming areas at Chickamauga Lake and Harrison Bay, and cool creek holes up on the plateau. They are welcome on a hot afternoon, but nobody should plan a trip around them.

Neither city is a food destination, and each cooks in its own idiom. Atlantic City splits between polished casino steakhouses and buffets and the older shore food outside them: Ducktown's Italian-American kitchens, big subs, boardwalk pizza, crab shacks in Gardner's Basin and saltwater taffy.

Chattanooga is Southern instead, with meat-and-three plates, biscuits, barbecue and catfish, plus chef-led restaurants and craft breweries around the Southside and Main Street. Seafood lovers lean towards the shore, while fans of comfort food and local beer lean towards Tennessee.

Chattanooga has more to see. Civil War ground at Point Park on Lookout Mountain and along Missionary Ridge, the Hunter Museum of American Art on its bluff, the Bessie Smith Cultural Center and the Walnut Street Bridge make for two or three full days.

Atlantic City's heritage is narrower: the story of the American seaside resort. It has the original Boardwalk, the Monopoly street names, Art Deco Boardwalk Hall with its giant pipe organ, and Lucy the Elephant in Margate. Casino towers have replaced most of the grand hotels, and a day covers it.

Atlantic City stays up far later. The gaming floors and lounges never close, and summer weekends bring resort nightclubs, pool parties and bars on the sand. The catch is that it all happens inside the resorts. The streets between them can feel uneasy after dark, and midweek or in winter the energy drains away.

Chattanooga's evenings are gentler: breweries, cocktail bars and patios on the Southside, with Station Street as the liveliest block. Most places wind down well before the small hours.

Here Chattanooga is in another league. Wooded ridges rise straight from the Tennessee River, offering rock climbing, hang gliding, mountain biking and paddling through the gorge. The Ocoee's Olympic whitewater, Cloudland Canyon and Fall Creek Falls are all within a short drive.

Atlantic City's outdoors is flat and watery. There are herons and shorebirds at the Forsythe wildlife refuge, kayaking and crabbing on the back bays, and canoeing in the Pine Barrens. These make a quiet morning rather than a reason to come.

Atlantic City has the stronger pair of outings. Philadelphia, with Independence Hall and its museums, is about an hour and a half away by train. Victorian Cape May is an hour south, and Ocean City, Wildwood, Smithville and Batsto fill in the gaps.

From Chattanooga, the biggest targets, Nashville and Atlanta, are each about two hours by car, which makes for long days. Huntsville's Space and Rocket Center and the Chickamauga battlefield are closer. Every outing from Chattanooga needs a car, whereas from the shore Philadelphia is at least reachable by rail.

Chattanooga is the more rewarding family base. The Tennessee Aquarium, the Creative Discovery Museum, the Incline Railway, Ruby Falls and Rock City are all aimed at children, and Coolidge Park adds a carousel and splash fountains. Summer heat and driving between sights take some planning.

In Atlantic City the beach does most of the work, helped by the rides on the Steel Pier and a climb inside Lucy the Elephant. Casino floors are closed to under-21s, though, and many parents stay in nearby Ocean City instead.

Both work without a car only in their centres, and the centres are shaped differently. Atlantic City is a straight line: the Boardwalk for walking, jitneys running along Pacific Avenue around the clock, and a rail link to Philadelphia. Chattanooga's downtown is a compact, walkable area joined to the North Shore by the Walnut Street Bridge and served by a free electric shuttle.

Beyond those cores, both need a car: for the refuge and Cape May in one case, and for Lookout Mountain and the trails in the other. Atlantic City's streets away from the Boardwalk are also unappealing to walk at night.

Saltwater taffy from the Boardwalk is the one thing Atlantic City sells that you could not buy anywhere else. Otherwise the shopping is an open-air outlet district of brand stores, arcades inside the casinos and stalls of T-shirts and beachwear.

Chattanooga has a little more character, though no more scale. Small boutiques and galleries line Frazier Avenue on the North Shore, there are shops in the converted railway warehouses of Warehouse Row, and the outdoor-gear stores are well stocked for the climbing and paddling nearby.

Atlantic City can come out cheaper, but only if you choose your dates well. Midweek and out of season, casino hotels cut their rates sharply, the beach and Boardwalk cost nothing, and subs and pizza are cheap. Summer weekends, resort fees and parking push the bill back up.

Chattanooga is steadier and moderate. Trails, parks and the shuttle are free, but the aquarium and the Lookout Mountain attractions charge full admission, and a hire car is hard to avoid. There is no off-peak trick that turns it into a bargain.

The two are close, and the difference is in what is on stage. Atlantic City is about touring headliners: pop and rock acts, comedians and boxing in casino arenas and Boardwalk Hall, plus free beach concerts in summer.

Chattanooga has a resident symphony and opera, the gilded 1920s Tivoli Theatre, a long-running community theatre, and bars where bands play bluegrass and Americana. Choose the shore for one big show, and Chattanooga for a smaller night of local music.

For a pampering afternoon, Atlantic City has the bigger resort spas, with treatments, saunas and indoor pools. The casinos around them are restless, though, and real calm mostly comes from an off-season walk by the winter sea.

Chattanooga has only a few hotel and day spas, but its everyday pace is slower. The best rest there is an unhurried afternoon on the riverfront or on a porch in Bluff View.