Atlantic City or Louisville?

This is Atlantic City's clearest advantage. A broad strip of pale sand runs under the Boardwalk, free to use and staffed by lifeguards. In late summer the open Atlantic is warm enough for proper swims, though you should stay between the flags because of rip currents. Margate and Longport carry the beach south into calmer residential stretches.

Louisville has nothing like this. The Ohio is a working river full of barges, so swimming means a pool or a drive out to the reservoir lakes in the Kentucky countryside.

Louisville is the better place to eat and drink, because its food has a clear local character. Bourbon bars on Whiskey Row and the downtown distillery tasting rooms come first. Then there's the hot brown, burgoo and Derby pie, plus Southern and farm-to-table cooking in NuLu, the Highlands and Butchertown.

Atlantic City splits between polished casino steakhouses and buffets on one side and older Atlantic City on the other: Ducktown's Italian-American cooking, big subs, boardwalk pizza and crab shacks on the back bays. It's enjoyable, but you wouldn't plan a trip around it.

Louisville has far more to see. Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby Museum, the Muhammad Ali Center, the Slugger and Frazier museums among Whiskey Row's cast iron, and the Speed Art Museum fill two or three days. Old Louisville's mansion blocks and Cave Hill Cemetery are good for slow walks.

Atlantic City's heritage is the seaside resort itself. You get the original Boardwalk, the Monopoly street names, Boardwalk Hall with its giant pipe organ, the Absecon Lighthouse and Lucy the Elephant down in Margate. It's charming, but you'll have seen it in a day.

Atlantic City has the bigger nights, and they're built around the casinos. Gaming floors and lounges never close, and on summer weekends the resorts run nightclubs and pool parties. The catch is that it all happens inside, the streets between resorts feel empty after dark, and midweek or in winter the energy drops away.

Louisville goes out to bars rather than clubs. There are dive bars and patios along Bardstown Road and bourbon and cocktail bars in NuLu, and it's at its liveliest around the Derby in spring.

Louisville has more green space within reach. Olmsted's Cherokee and Iroquois parks have wooded hills, the Big Four Bridge walkway crosses the Ohio, and you can walk out over the fossil beds at the Falls of the Ohio. Bernheim Forest and Mammoth Cave make longer outings.

Atlantic City's landscape is flat barrier island and salt marsh. The Forsythe wildlife refuge is excellent for herons and shorebirds, and the bays suit kayaking and crabbing, but there's nothing very scenic about it.

Both make good bases for excursions, but the outings are very different. From Atlantic City you can take the train to Philadelphia's Independence Hall and Liberty Bell, or drive down to Cape May's Victorian streets and the boardwalk towns along the shore.

From Louisville the trips are rural: distillery tours around Bardstown, thoroughbred farms and Keeneland near Lexington, and Shaker Village. Almost all of them need a car and, for the bourbon, a designated driver.

Louisville is the more rounded choice with children. It has a well-regarded zoo, the Kentucky Science Center, Kentucky Kingdom's coasters and water park, underground ziplines in the Mega Cavern and splash areas along the waterfront.

In Atlantic City, the beach does nearly all the work, helped by Steel Pier's rides, the small aquarium and Lucy the Elephant. Casinos are closed to anyone under 21, so many families stay instead in Ocean City, which bans alcohol sales, a short drive south.

Atlantic City is simpler to manage without a car, at least on the island. The Boardwalk is a long, level walk past the beach and casinos, jitneys run along Pacific Avenue day and night, and rail links reach Philadelphia.

Louisville has no rail transit and buses that are of little use to visitors. Downtown, the waterfront and NuLu are walkable, but Churchill Downs, the Highlands and the parks all mean driving or ride-hailing. Traffic is light, at least.

Neither city is much of a shopping destination, and what you'd bring home is quite different. Atlantic City offers an outlet district with American brands, casino shopping arcades and Boardwalk saltwater taffy. Louisville has NuLu's small design shops, vintage clothing and records on Bardstown Road, and bottles of bourbon that are hard to find anywhere else.

Atlantic City can be the cheaper of the two if you time it well. Casino hotels cut their rates sharply midweek and out of season, and the beach and Boardwalk cost nothing. Summer weekends are the opposite, with steep rates plus resort fees and parking on top.

Louisville's hotels are moderately priced outside racing season. Its daily costs build up, though, through tax and tips on every meal, admission to museums and distilleries, and the steady cost of a hire car or ride-hailing. During Derby week, room rates rise several times over.

Louisville has the richer stage. The Kentucky Center is home to the city's orchestra, opera and ballet, and Actors Theatre has long staged new American plays. Summer brings Shakespeare in Central Park and concerts at the Iroquois Amphitheater, and Bardstown Road bars play bluegrass and Americana.

Atlantic City is about headliners: touring rock and pop acts, comedians and boxing at Boardwalk Hall and the casino arenas, with free beach concerts in summer. You build the weekend around one show.

Neither is a place to go for wellness, but Atlantic City gives you a little more on the spot. Several casino hotels have large spas with saunas and indoor pools, and an out-of-season walk by the winter sea can be truly calming. Louisville relies on hotel day spas and slow porch afternoons in the Highlands. Its real spa option, the old mineral-spring resorts of French Lick and West Baden Springs, is about an hour and a half away in Indiana.