Buenos Aires or Salta?

Neither city is a beach destination. In Buenos Aires the Río de la Plata is too silty for swimming, so the Costanera is for strolling and lying on the grass. The Atlantic resorts are several days' trip away. Salta is hundreds of kilometres from any coast, and the nearest open water is the Cabra Corral reservoir an hour south, which is mostly used for boating. In both cities a hotel pool is the realistic way to cool off.

Buenos Aires has more to eat and more ways to eat it. There are wood-fired parrillas, pizza and pasta from the Italian side of the city, gelato, and grand café houses such as Café Tortoni, with ambitious modern kitchens and wine bars in Palermo on top.

Salta's cooking is a different tradition, the corn-based food of the Andes: small baked empanadas salteñas, humitas, tamales, locro and llama, best eaten at the central market with a glass of Torrontés. It is distinctive and satisfying, but the choice narrows quickly and fine dining is rare.

In Buenos Aires the culture is on a larger scale. Avenida de Mayo runs from the Casa Rosada to Congress, Recoleta has its marble cemetery, and two major art museums, the Bellas Artes and MALBA, are worth hours each. San Telmo and La Boca add older streets and painted houses.

Salta's appeal is that it is easy to take in. It has one of the best-kept colonial centres in Argentina, around the Plaza 9 de Julio and the red-and-gold San Francisco church. Its single remarkable museum holds the preserved Inca children from Llullaillaco. A day or two covers it.

This is where the two cities differ most. Buenos Aires runs a full night out until sunrise: cocktail bars behind unmarked doors in Palermo Soho and Hollywood, electronic clubs in warehouse streets and by the river, scruffy San Telmo bars and milongas full of locals dancing tango.

Salta keeps the same late hours but has far less on offer. Going out mostly happens on Calle Balcarce, which is lively at weekends and quiet midweek. It suits a late drink and some folk music rather than serious clubbing.

Salta has the landscapes. It sits in a green valley ringed by hills, with the cloud forest of San Lorenzo on its edge. Further out are the red rock formations of the Quebrada de las Conchas and the climb over the Cuesta del Obispo into cactus country.

Buenos Aires is flat pampas beside a vast brown river. Its outdoor time means jogging loops in the Bosques de Palermo, birdwatching in the Costanera Sur wetland, or kayaking the channels of the Paraná Delta. For mountains, people fly from the capital to places like Salta.

From Buenos Aires, day trips are short and simple. A fast ferry reaches the cobbled old town of Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay in about an hour. The train takes you to Tigre and the delta, and San Antonio de Areco, Luján and La Plata are all easy outings.

Salta's surroundings are more dramatic, with Cafayate's bodegas, the adobe villages of the Quebrada de Humahuaca, Cachi and the Tren a las Nubes. Most of these mean leaving at dawn or staying overnight, so they suit a longer stay rather than a quick return.

Buenos Aires gives children more to do. There are pedal boats and playgrounds in the Palermo parks, the planetarium, the Museo de los Niños for rainy days, and the Temaikèn biopark and Tigre's amusement park within an hour. The downsides are long distances, heavy traffic and broken pavements.

Salta is gentler day to day, because its centre is compact and easy to get around. Once the cable car and the archaeology museum are done, though, there is little aimed at young visitors, and the big sights involve winding drives up to altitude.

Buenos Aires has a proper network: the Subte, the oldest metro in the Southern Hemisphere, colectivo buses that run day and night, and plenty of taxis. You need it, because Palermo, Recoleta and San Telmo are far apart.

Salta's colonial centre is a small flat grid you can walk in a morning. The trouble starts once you want to leave it, because the valleys and gorges are served only by long-distance buses. Most visitors join tours or hire a car for slow mountain roads, some of them gravel.

Buenos Aires is the better place to shop. Leather jackets and bags are the thing to buy, Palermo Soho has independent designers, Avenida Alvear has upmarket boutiques, and there is the long Sunday antiques fair on Calle Defensa in San Telmo.

Salta is for regional crafts: the red-and-black poncho salteño, llama and alpaca weaving, and silver and carved wood from the artisan market. Bottles of Torrontés are good to take home too. Beyond that its shops are mainstream.

Buenos Aires sits in the middle on price. Hotels usually cost less than in a European capital of a similar size, the Subte and colectivo buses cost very little, and a good bottle of Malbec is cheap by international standards. Imported goods are expensive, though, and the smartest districts charge as much as the dearer cities of Europe.

Salta is cheaper for the basics, whether that is a room in the centre, a meal or a ride across town. The difference is in where the money goes. In the capital most of what you come for is a metro ride away, but in Salta the canyons, the Cafayate vineyards and the Tren a las Nubes are the reason for the trip, and getting out to them takes a large share of the cost. Argentina's currency has a long history of sharp swings, so check how best to pay before visiting either city.

Buenos Aires is on a different level here. It has the Teatro Colón for opera, ballet and symphony concerts, the playhouses of Avenida Corrientes, a huge independent theatre scene, and tango from polished dinner shows to milongas with live orchestras.

Salta's strength is narrower but very much its own: folk music. In the peñas, guitar and bombo drum carry zambas and chacareras late into the night, and the vigil at the Güemes monument is a high point. Formal concerts and theatre are limited to the provincial theatre.

Neither city has a spa culture, and both rely on hotel spas. The difference is the pace. Buenos Aires is loud and runs all night, and you slow down mainly in a café or over a long sobremesa after a meal.

Salta slows down on its own. It closes for a long siesta, the plaza cafés are calm in the evening, and you can stay at estancias or in leafy San Lorenzo. Hot springs are a long drive away at Rosario de la Frontera.