Carmel-by-the-Sea or Los Angeles?

Los Angeles has much more beach. More than 100km of shore runs from Malibu's coves through Santa Monica and Venice to the South Bay, with volleyball nets, lifeguard towers, surf breaks and a bike path along the sand. Carmel has one lovely curve of white sand below Ocean Avenue, backed by cypress trees and good for sunset walks, but its cold water and strong surf make it a place to look at rather than swim.

Neither is a warm-water swimming destination. In late summer, though, Los Angeles water is several degrees warmer, and its lifeguarded beaches make wading or surfing easy. South of Carmel, Monastery Beach and Carmel River State Beach are even more dramatic and even more dangerous to swim at.

Carmel eats well for a village, with French and Italian dining rooms, cottage bistros, Dungeness crab and sand dabs from the bay, and Pinot Noir from the nearby highlands. The range is narrow, though: little that is casual or cheap, almost nothing from beyond Europe and California, and dinner tends to end early.

Los Angeles operates on another scale. Its immigrant communities cook at full strength, with tacos across the Eastside, charcoal barbecue in Koreatown, regional Chinese food in the San Gabriel Valley, and Ethiopian, Armenian and Oaxacan kitchens besides. It also has places to graze, such as Grand Central Market. The drawback is that you drive between them.

Los Angeles has far more to see: the Getty Center and Getty Villa, LACMA and the Broad, the Huntington's library and gardens, Griffith Observatory, the studio lots and the Art Deco downtown. It is modern culture spread across many neighbourhoods.

Carmel's appeal is older and smaller. Mission San Carlos Borromeo, founded in 1771 and the burial place of Junípero Serra, is a finer mission than anything left in Los Angeles. Add the storybook cottages and Robinson Jeffers' hand-built Tor House and you have a morning or two, not a week.

The gap here is as wide as it gets. In Carmel an evening out means a wine bar before it closes, a long dinner and perhaps a nightcap in a hotel lounge, and the lanes are dark and quiet by ten.

Los Angeles offers velvet-rope clubs in Hollywood, the gay bars of West Hollywood's Santa Monica Boulevard, cocktails in old downtown bank buildings and natural wine in Echo Park. Last orders are at 2am, and crossing between districts takes a ride, so most nights stay in one neighbourhood.

Both have exceptional landscapes, but Carmel's begin at the edge of the village. Point Lobos, with its granite headlands, sea otters and wintering grey whales, is five minutes away, Bixby Bridge and the Big Sur bluffs are about half an hour on, and Monterey Bay adds kayaking among otters and kelp-forest diving.

Los Angeles counters with height and variety: Griffith Park, the chaparral ridges of the Santa Monica Mountains, and the San Gabriels rising above 3,000m with pine forest and winter snow. Boats also run out to the Channel Islands. The difference is effort, since traffic and summer heat stand between you and most of it.

Carmel's outings start almost at the door. Cannery Row and the old adobe capital of Monterey are a short drive, Pacific Grove's Victorian houses and lighthouse sit beside it, and the tasting rooms of Carmel Valley Village are half an hour inland. Salinas and the Steinbeck farm country, the mission plaza at San Juan Bautista and the Santa Cruz boardwalk make fuller days, while San Francisco is a long haul.

From Los Angeles the destinations are bigger names but further off, and traffic decides how far you get: a two-hour drive at dawn can stretch to three by afternoon. Santa Barbara is the pick, with its mission, red-tile streets and the Santa Ynez vineyards behind. After it come the ferry to Catalina's harbour at Avalon, the galleries of Laguna Beach and Ojai's orange-grove valley.

Los Angeles is one of the strongest family destinations anywhere. It has Disneyland and Universal Studios, the roller coasters of Magic Mountain, the space shuttle at the California Science Center, the fossil pits at La Brea and the fun fair on Santa Monica Pier. The cost is time in the car.

Carmel is calm and safe, but it is built for adults. Its family appeal rests on the Monterey Bay Aquarium nearby and the tide pools at Point Lobos and Pacific Grove. That suits school-age children who love wildlife, though not those who want rides, and the cold surf rules out paddling.

Both need a car, but Carmel is the easier of the two. The village is a square mile you can walk from Ocean Avenue down to the sand, and its drives to Point Lobos or the aquarium are short, even if buses are scarce and the lanes are unlit at night.

Los Angeles spreads across a basin of separate cities with jammed freeways between them. Metro lines usefully link downtown with Hollywood, Pasadena and Santa Monica, and Venice and Old Pasadena are pleasant on foot. Elsewhere it is a hire car or ride-hailing, and a plan to stick to one area each day.

Carmel's shopping is a pleasant afternoon of browsing: an unusual number of galleries showing plein-air painting and photography, with cashmere and jewellery boutiques tucked into courtyards. It has no department store and no real market.

Los Angeles is a serious shopping city. Rodeo Drive has the luxury houses, Melrose mixes streetwear with vintage, and Abbot Kinney has independent labels. The Rose Bowl flea market is a hunting ground for vintage, and the Fashion District sells fabric by the bolt. Covering more than one area a day takes a car.

Both are expensive, but Carmel is harder on the wallet. Its boutique inns and cottages charge luxury prices out of season, and there is almost no cheap food to balance a costly dinner. Many visitors stay in Monterey or Seaside and drive in.

Los Angeles has costly hotels, car hire, parking and theme park tickets, but it offers more ways to save. Taco trucks, Koreatown and the San Gabriel Valley feed you well for little, and the beaches, Griffith Observatory and the Getty are free.

Los Angeles is a major music city all year round. The Philharmonic plays at the Walt Disney Concert Hall and moves to the Hollywood Bowl in summer. On top of that come LA Opera, Broadway tours at the Pantages, rock rooms on the Sunset Strip, improv theatres and jazz in Leimert Park.

Carmel's arts are seasonal but have real character. The Bach Festival has run since 1935, and plays are staged at the outdoor Forest Theater among the pines. The Monterey Jazz Festival is nearby each September. Out of season, expect only the occasional concert.

In Carmel, the place itself is what relaxes you. A few days of cliff-top walks, early nights and a fire in the room slow you down without any effort, and a spa day at one of the Pebble Beach or Carmel Valley resorts is about as far as the treatments go. Beyond the hotel pool there is nothing to soak in, with no springs and no public baths.

Los Angeles is the reverse: it has better facilities but a more stressful setting. Its Korean bathhouses give it a real bathing culture that Carmel cannot match, where an evening can pass between hot pools, steam rooms and a scrub, and yoga and spa visits are part of ordinary life. The calm ends at the bathhouse door, though, and the drive home through traffic undoes much of it. That is why people who want real quiet head out to Ojai or the desert springs.