Bar Harbor or Rehoboth Beach?

The two coasts are very different. Bar Harbor's shore is granite. Sand Beach in Acadia is a pretty cove of crushed shell, but the Gulf of Maine stays bitterly cold, so most real swimming happens in freshwater at Echo Lake or Lake Wood.

Rehoboth Beach was built around its sand. A long, lifeguarded beach runs in front of the boardwalk, wilder stretches lie at Cape Henlopen and Delaware Seashore State Park, and the summer sea is warm enough to stay in for a long time. If time in the water matters to you, Rehoboth is the place.

Both towns eat well for their size, and the difference lies in the seafood and the setting. Bar Harbor is about Maine lobster boiled whole at waterfront shacks, chowder, wild blueberry pies and the long tradition of popovers at Jordan Pond House.

Rehoboth leans towards Mid-Atlantic steamed crabs, crab cakes and vinegar-soaked boardwalk fries. Its long role as a summer escape from Washington has given it more chef-led dining rooms, and its brewing tradition goes deeper. In both towns much of the eating scene closes down out of season.

Bar Harbor has a little more to see, though in neither town will sightseeing take more than a morning. The Abbe Museum tells the story of the Wabanaki, Maine's Native peoples. The Shore Path passes Gilded Age cottages that survived the fire of 1947, St Saviour's has its Tiffany windows, and you pass the hand-cut granite bridges of the carriage roads on a bike ride.

Rehoboth's history lies in its founding as a Methodist camp meeting in the 1870s, which you can still see in its old cottages and shaded streets. The main stop is the Rehoboth Art League, with its galleries set in a garden in Henlopen Acres. Visitors who want more history usually drive to Lewes or to the wartime towers at Cape Henlopen.

Rehoboth Beach has a real night scene, and Bar Harbor mostly doesn't. Rehoboth's long history as an LGBTQ resort gives it piano lounges, drag nights and sociable bars around Baltimore Avenue, and nearby Dewey Beach adds loud outdoor deck bars full of younger visitors.

In Bar Harbor an evening means a taproom or harbour-view pub on Main Street, often with hikers who are heading to bed early to catch sunrise on Cadillac Mountain. Neither town has proper clubs, and both go quiet once summer ends.

This is Bar Harbor's great strength. Acadia's granite mountains drop straight into the sea, with trails that range from the surf-side Ocean Path to the exposed ladders of the Precipice and the Beehive. Somes Sound, the tidal walk to Bar Island, sea kayaking, puffin cruises and blazing autumn colour add to it.

Rehoboth Beach's outdoors is flat and gentle: dunes and pine woods at Cape Henlopen, the cycle trail through wetland to Lewes, and calm bays for paddleboarding, with dolphins offshore and the Assateague ponies about an hour away. It is pleasant, but it has none of the drama of Acadia.

Rehoboth Beach has more variety within easy reach. Historic Lewes is minutes away, and from there the ferry crosses Delaware Bay to the Victorian streets of Cape May. Ocean City, Berlin, Dover and Chincoteague round out the options.

From Bar Harbor, most outings stay on Mount Desert Island: harbour villages such as Northeast Harbor and Bass Harbor, and the ferry to the Cranberry Isles. Castine, Blue Hill, Stonington and Camden are lovely but involve longer drives. Either way you will need a car.

Rehoboth Beach is the easier choice for children. It has lifeguarded sand steps from the rental houses, Funland's gentle rides on the boardwalk, a water park and mini-golf just outside town, and calm bay water at Cape Henlopen for toddlers.

Bar Harbor suits older, active children better. They can explore tide pools, walk the sandbar to Bar Island, cycle the flat carriage roads, take part in the junior ranger programme and go whale-watching. The cold sea and the lack of anything indoors for wet days make it harder going with little ones.

Bar Harbor's downtown is compact. In summer the free Island Explorer buses run to Acadia's trailheads, Jordan Pond and the island villages, so many visitors never need a car. Out of season the buses stop and you need a car for the park, while in high summer the Park Loop Road clogs and trailhead parking fills early.

Over a whole stay, Rehoboth is the easier of the two. Downtown, the boardwalk and the beach are a short walk apart on a flat grid, and bikes are the natural way to get about, with the cycle trail running on to Lewes. A seasonal trolley and local buses reach Dewey Beach and the outlets. The hard part is getting there: there is no train, and the highway jams on summer weekends.

Rehoboth Beach is the better place for shopping. Delaware has no sales tax, which draws people from several states to the big outlet centres on the highway, and Rehoboth Avenue has independent boutiques, bookshops and home stores.

Bar Harbor's shopping is a summer stroll past fleece, fudge and lobster souvenirs. Maine crafts such as wooden bowls, pottery and knitwear are the finds worth taking home.

Neither town is cheap in its season, and in both most of the bill goes on somewhere to sleep. Bar Harbor's peak lasts longer: a small island town with few beds keeps its top rates through the autumn colour as well as midsummer, and much of what people come for has a price, from the park pass to a puffin boat and a lobster supper. What softens it is that the best of Acadia, its trails, bike rides and fare-free buses, costs nothing once you are there, and a campsite is the cheapest bed on the island.

Rehoboth comes out slightly ahead because its main attraction is free. A day on the sand needs only a towel and an umbrella, and with no sales tax the outlets make shopping cheaper than at home. The costs bite on summer weekends, when rooms near the beach and metered parking are at their dearest, so a midweek stay goes further. In spring and autumn Rehoboth's rooms come down sharply, whereas Bar Harbor's lower rates arrive with a much thinner choice of places to eat and stay.

Live performance in both towns is small and seasonal, and Rehoboth has a little more going on. It has free summer concerts at the bandstand, a local company staging musicals and cabaret for much of the year, and an autumn film festival.

Bar Harbor's highlights are the chamber-music festivals held in island churches in July and August, and the 1932 art deco Criterion Theatre on Cottage Street. Out of season there is very little in either town.

Spa culture is thin on both coasts. In Bar Harbor it amounts to a massage at one of the larger hotels or inns. The real rest comes from a porch over Frenchman Bay in June or after the autumn colour fades, when the harbour is still and the days follow the tides.

Rehoboth has a few day spas and yoga studios, and its quiet spells come in June, in September and on autumn weekends, with long walks on the empty boardwalk and bike rides under the pines. In high summer both towns are crowded, and you have to look harder for calm.