Beaver Creek or South Lake Tahoe?

At Beaver Creek, swimming means a heated hotel pool. The only open water nearby is the small, snowmelt-cold lake at Nottingham Park in Avon.

South Lake Tahoe has a proper shoreline. Sandy beaches under Jeffrey pines run along the south shore, and the boulder coves of Sand Harbor are a short drive away. The water is cold even in high summer, so swimming is really for July and August, but the clear turquoise shallows have nothing like them in the Colorado valley.

Neither place has a local cuisine, but Beaver Creek eats a little better. Its kitchens turn out refined mountain cooking, such as elk, Colorado lamb and trout with long wine lists, and you can ride a snowcat sleigh up to an on-mountain lodge for dinner. Vail, close by, adds more choice.

South Lake Tahoe runs on casino steakhouses, buffets, pizza and brewpubs along Highway 50. Quality is patchy and busy weekends mean long waits. Its own small craft breweries are the best thing to seek out.

Neither is a sightseeing destination, but South Lake Tahoe has a little more to see. You can walk among the early 20th-century lakeside estates at the Tallac Historic Site, hike down to Vikingsholm at Emerald Bay, and learn about the Washoe people at the local museum.

Beaver Creek was built as a resort around 1980. Beyond the outdoor art around its alpine-style plaza, which takes an hour to see, there is nothing historic to visit without driving to the old mining towns.

Evenings in Beaver Creek end early. You get après-ski by the plaza fire pits, a hotel lounge after dinner, and anything livelier means a drive to Vail.

South Lake Tahoe offers more, thanks to the state line. The casino towers at Stateline keep their bars and gaming floors open all night, and a club or two fills up on long weekends and peak weeks. Choice is still thin, with no bar district and little street life, but staying out late is possible here in a way it isn't in Beaver Creek.

Both are outstanding mountain bases, and they differ in kind. Beaver Creek is above all a ski mountain, with famously uncrowded runs linked to Bachelor Gulch and Arrowhead and Vail's vast terrain next door. Colorado's dry, sunny winters suit it well. In summer you get the Holy Cross Wilderness, gold-medal fly-fishing and rafting on the Eagle and Colorado rivers.

South Lake Tahoe is built around water and granite. The lake, Emerald Bay and the lake-filled basins of the Desolation Wilderness are the main attractions, with kayaking and paddleboarding on calm mornings. Heavenly's gondola rises straight from town, though winter skiing is wetter and stormier than in the Rockies.

South Lake Tahoe has the more varied outings. You can see Gold Rush and silver-boom history at Virginia City and Coloma, go wine tasting in Amador, spend a casino day in Reno, or simply drive the loop around the lake.

From Beaver Creek, the choices are mostly other mountain towns, such as Vail, Victorian Leadville, Breckenridge and Glenwood Springs. They are pleasant but quite alike, so a second or third day out feels less different from the first.

Both work well for families on outdoor trips, and neither has a zoo or aquarium for a bad-weather day. Beaver Creek is the easier resort for small children on skis. It has a large ski school, covered escalators up from the car parks, an ice rink, warm cookies when the lifts close, and a car-free plaza where older children can roam.

South Lake Tahoe is better for a summer family trip, with shallow sandy beaches, bike paths and the salmon run at Taylor Creek. You will need a car, though, and the Stateline casino strip is not a place to linger with children.

Beaver Creek is easier to manage without a car. The village core is pedestrian, outdoor escalators link its levels, many lodgings are ski-in ski-out, and free shuttles and valley buses reach Avon and Vail. Eagle airport is about half an hour away.

In South Lake Tahoe, only the area around Stateline and the gondola is walkable. Beaches, trailheads and the other ski areas are spread out, summer weekend traffic crawls around Emerald Bay, and winter storms bring chain controls on the roads in.

Beaver Creek's plaza is made for browsing, with galleries of bronze sculpture and landscape painting, western boots and leather, and luxury outerwear, although everything is expensive. South Lake Tahoe's shops serve the trip rather than the shopper: ski rental, outdoor gear, souvenirs around the gondola base and a supermarket for stocking the cabin.

Beaver Creek costs far more, and there is very little you can do about it. Staying down the valley in Avon or coming in summer saves a little, but luxury lodging, lift tickets and ski school still put it out of reach of any real budget.

South Lake Tahoe gives you more ways to control the bill. Peak weeks are expensive, but the casino hotels on the Nevada side cut their rates midweek and in spring and autumn. Cooking in a rented cabin saves on meals, and the beaches and trails cost nothing.

Beaver Creek has the stronger arts calendar. Its own intimate theatre, the Vilar Performing Arts Center, hosts touring concerts, dance and comedy, and in summer the Bravo! Vail festival brings major American orchestras to the open-air amphitheatre in Vail, alongside a dance festival and a jazz series.

South Lake Tahoe's live entertainment is mostly in the casino showrooms, with rock, country, comedy and tribute acts. Its best summer evenings are outdoors, at Shakespeare on the beach at Sand Harbor or a concert among the Tallac estates.

For a spa vacation, Beaver Creek is the clear choice. Its resort spas are among the largest in the Rockies, with steam rooms and hot tubs in the snow, the village is calm after dark, and the historic hot spring pool at Glenwood Springs is about an hour away.

South Lake Tahoe's spas are mostly attached to casinos and lodges. Its restful side is the setting itself: quiet mornings by the lake, cabins among the pines, and a soak at Grover Hot Springs or in the Carson Valley, both within an hour.