Atlantic City or Virginia Beach?

Both are built on the same thing: a broad strip of free, pale sand under a boardwalk. Atlantic City's beach runs the length of Absecon Island beneath the casino towers and gets quieter through Ventnor and Margate. The surf and rip currents there mean you swim between the flags.

Virginia Beach is the better beach destination because it has more kinds of shore. The calm Chesapeake Bay water around First Landing suits small children, Sandbridge has dunes and beach houses instead of towers, and the surfing near the fishing pier has a long local following. The water is a degree or two warmer as well.

Neither city is a reason to travel for food, but the two eat differently. Atlantic City's character is Italian-American and boardwalk. You get red-sauce restaurants in Ducktown, oversized subs on soft rolls, pizza and the saltwater taffy sold on the Boardwalk for over a century, with polished but predictable steakhouses and buffets inside the casinos.

In Virginia Beach almost everything comes back to the Chesapeake. That means Lynnhaven oysters, blue crab steamed with Old Bay or made into she-crab soup, and fried flounder, best eaten at dockside places around Lynnhaven Inlet rather than on the chain-heavy Oceanfront. For more variety, people drive into Norfolk.

Neither will fill more than a day, but Virginia Beach has slightly more history. Cape Henry is where English colonists first landed in 1607, and the Old Cape Henry Lighthouse and the early brick Adam Thoroughgood House take you back to the colonial era.

Atlantic City's heritage is the American seaside resort itself. Its Boardwalk is the original, its streets gave the Monopoly board their names, Boardwalk Hall holds the world's largest pipe organ, and down the coast in Margate stands Lucy, the six-storey wooden elephant. It is quirky and enjoyable, but there is less of it.

Atlantic City is the stronger night out, mainly because the casinos never close. The gaming floors and lounges run until morning, and the bigger resorts put on nightclubs and pool parties on summer weekends that draw people from Philadelphia and New York. The blocks between the resorts are bleak after dark, though, and midweek or winter nights are flat.

Virginia Beach is more casual and stops earlier. It has beach bars, rooftop decks and sports bars along Atlantic Avenue full of vacationers and sailors, and cocktail bars at Town Center, but almost no club culture. For more character, locals drive to Ghent in Norfolk.

Both sit on flat coastal plain, but Virginia Beach has much more to do outdoors. First Landing State Park has trails through maritime forest, cypress swamp and dunes. Back Bay and False Cape protect a long, empty barrier spit that you reach on foot or by bike, and summer kayak trips go out to see dolphins.

Atlantic City's best natural spot is the Forsythe refuge, where a wildlife loop crosses marshes full of herons and egrets. There is canoeing in the Pine Barrens about an hour inland and crabbing in the back bays, which make pleasant breaks from the beach rather than a reason to come.

Both have good day trips, of different kinds. From Atlantic City the big one is Philadelphia, reachable by train for Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell and a big-city museum scene. Cape May's Victorian streets are about an hour south, and Ocean City, Wildwood and the ironworks village of Batsto are closer still.

Virginia Beach's best outing is colonial history: Colonial Williamsburg, Jamestown and Yorktown, all within about an hour. Norfolk's battleship and art museum are nearer, and the Wright brothers' Kitty Hawk is further south. Almost all of these need a car.

Virginia Beach is the far better family resort. The Virginia Aquarium, with its sea turtles, otters and marsh trail, is a full day out on its own. Add a water park, mini-golf, bikes on the boardwalk and calm bay beaches for toddlers, with a big amusement park and Colonial Williamsburg's costumed tradespeople within an hour.

In Atlantic City, children mostly rely on the beach, the rides on the Steel Pier and a climb inside Lucy the Elephant. Casinos are off limits to under-21s and some blocks away from the Boardwalk are rundown, which is why many families stay in Ocean City instead.

Atlantic City is easier without a car. Its long, straight layout keeps everything along the Boardwalk, jitney buses run up and down Pacific Avenue all night, and trains link it with Philadelphia. Away from the Boardwalk, though, the streets are not pleasant to walk.

Virginia Beach is suburban sprawl. Beyond the Oceanfront strip and its summer trolley, the buses are sparse and slow, so reaching Sandbridge, First Landing or Town Center means driving, often in heavy summer traffic.

There is little to choose between them, and nobody comes to either for the shops. Atlantic City has an open-air outlet district you can walk to from the Boardwalk, shopping arcades inside the casinos and boxes of saltwater taffy, the one souvenir worth taking home. Virginia Beach is spread across a regional mall, Town Center and strip centres, with surf shops on the Oceanfront that go back a long way.

Atlantic City tends to work out a little cheaper, mostly because the casino hotels cut room rates heavily midweek and out of season, and much of the entertainment costs nothing. Resort fees, parking and summer weekend rates can wipe out those savings, though.

Virginia Beach follows a similar seasonal pattern, with expensive oceanfront rooms and beach houses in summer and much lower rates afterwards. The state parks and beaches are nearly free, but needing a car for almost everything adds a steady cost that Atlantic City visitors can often avoid.

Neither has much resident culture, and in both, live entertainment means touring acts. In Atlantic City those are headliners and comedians in casino showrooms, plus concerts, boxing and the occasional organ recital at Boardwalk Hall.

Virginia Beach has rock and country at its big outdoor amphitheatre and free concerts on stages along the boardwalk. Its advantage is Norfolk, half an hour away, with the Virginia Opera, the Virginia Symphony and the spring Virginia Arts Festival.

Atlantic City has the bigger spas. Several casino hotels have full treatment rooms, saunas and indoor pools for a pampering afternoon, but you walk out of them into the noise and lights of the gaming floors. Its peaceful side comes in winter, when the Boardwalk empties beside a grey sea.

Virginia Beach relaxes you through its pace rather than its facilities, since its hotel and suburban day spas are modest. The calm comes in early mornings on the boardwalk and in the quiet spring and autumn months, either side of a high summer that is crowded and loud. Neither city has a bathing tradition of its own.