Bethany Beach or Detroit?

This is Bethany Beach's strongest point. A wide band of pale sand runs the length of the town, with lifeguards on duty all summer. Within half an hour you also have the empty dunes of Delaware Seashore State Park and quieter Fenwick Island, and the Inland Bays give small children calm water.

Detroit can manage a summer afternoon swim at most, either at the small beach on Belle Isle or the shallow lakeside lawns of Lake St. Clair Metropark. Its season is shorter, and the beaches sometimes close after heavy rain.

Detroit has far more to eat. Its local dishes, the chilli-topped Coney dog and crisp-edged square pizza, are worth the trip on their own. Add the Saturday crowds at Eastern Market, the Arab American bakeries and grills of Dearborn, Mexicantown and the Polish bakeries of Hamtramck.

Bethany Beach eats like a seaside resort. You get steamed blue crabs at picnic tables, fried clams, boardwalk fries and taffy, plus sweet corn and peaches from the farm stands. For more choice you have to drive to Rehoboth Beach.

Detroit's sights are serious. The Detroit Institute of Arts and the Diego Rivera murals in its courtyard come first, followed by the Motown Museum, the Charles H. Wright Museum and a full day at the Henry Ford complex in Dearborn. Downtown's Art Deco towers, such as the Guardian Building, are sights in their own right, though there are dull stretches between the highlights.

Bethany Beach has almost nothing to compare. There is the carved totem pole at the boardwalk, a small collection on its church-camp origins and the Second World War watchtowers along the shore.

This is the city that invented techno. Detroit's nights include warehouse parties and small clubs where the music comes first, as well as dive bars and cocktail bars in Corktown and Midtown. The scene is scattered, though, so a night out usually means taxis between neighbourhoods.

Bethany Beach is quiet on purpose. Evenings are a boardwalk stroll and dinner. Anyone who wants late beach bars has to drive to Dewey Beach or Ocean City.

Both are flat, and both centre on water, but Bethany Beach puts more of the outdoors on your doorstep. You can paddle on the Inland Bays, surf or fish at Indian River Inlet, and watch ospreys over the salt marsh. Assateague's wild ponies are under an hour away. In high summer, though, there are a lot of mosquitoes.

Detroit's outdoors are urban: the Olmsted-designed woods and lagoon of Belle Isle, cycling on the RiverWalk, and a ring of metroparks that are best in autumn colour. Long grey winters push most outdoor plans indoors.

The outings are about as good in both places but very different. From Bethany Beach you follow the coast. The options are historic Lewes and its maritime museum, Victorian Berlin, Chincoteague, or the ferry across Delaware Bay to Cape May.

Around Detroit the trips are inland and more varied. You can go to the university town of Ann Arbor, the Bavarian-style Frankenmuth, the Toledo art museum, or across the river into Canada at Windsor if you have a passport. In both places you will need a car.

Bethany Beach is the easier choice with young children. The beach is guarded, the town is small and safe, the bandstand has free evening shows, and days revolve around bikes, crabbing and ice cream. It has no zoo or aquarium, and much of it closes outside summer.

Detroit has the bigger attractions: a large zoo with a polar bear tunnel, the hands-on Michigan Science Center, and steam trains at Greenfield Village. They are spread across the metro area, though, so you spend more time in the car.

Neither is easy without a car, but for different reasons. In Bethany Beach the town itself is small enough that you can leave the car parked and walk or cycle between your rental and the sand. Anything further afield means driving, and summer weekends clog the coast highway.

Detroit has more transit in its core. The People Mover loops around downtown and the QLine runs up Woodward Avenue to the museums. Beyond that line the avenues are wide, the buses are slow, and Dearborn or the zoo means driving or ride-hailing.

Detroit offers a bit more, mostly local and independent. Midtown and Corktown have vintage shops and makers selling Detroit-made watches and leather goods, Eastern Market has crafts, and Dearborn sells specialist sweets. There is no central shopping street, though.

Bethany Beach has only surf shops, gift stores and beach-read bookshops in town. Its real draw is the tax-free outlet malls outside Rehoboth Beach, a short drive north.

Detroit is the cheaper trip. Its hotels cost less than most big American cities' outside event nights, and Coney dogs, pizza and Middle Eastern meals are cheap, though a hire car, tips and sales tax add up.

Bethany Beach is expensive in July and August, when weekly beach-house rentals near the ocean and resort-priced dinners dominate the budget. June, September and self-catering bring the cost down a good deal, and Delaware charges no sales tax.

Detroit is a real music city. It has the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in Orchestra Hall, opera in a restored downtown house, touring shows at the Fox and Fisher theatres, and deep jazz roots, including the free Labor Day festival in the streets. Small venues also carry on the Motown, soul and gospel tradition.

In Bethany Beach, live music means free cover bands and brass groups at the boardwalk bandstand on summer evenings, with families sitting on blankets on the grass.

Neither place has a spa tradition, but Bethany Beach is much more restful. Its leafy residential streets, quiet evening boardwalk and near-silent spring and autumn suit reading, sleeping and long walks.

Detroit runs on work, sport and music. The calmest it gets is an afternoon on Belle Isle or a slow walk on the RiverWalk, and beyond that you are left with hotel spas.