Carmel-by-the-Sea or South Lake Tahoe?

Carmel Beach is the lovelier place to spread a blanket: white sand under the cypresses, with Pebble Beach across the bay. But the Pacific stays cold all year and the surf is strong, and the coves to the south are too dangerous to swim. Most visitors walk on the sand and swim in a hotel pool.

South Lake Tahoe is where you actually get in the water. Pope, Baldwin and Kiva beaches and Zephyr Cove have shallow, glass-clear water over white sand. At this altitude it is bracing even in August, though, and the swimming season is really just July and August.

Carmel has the better table by some way. It has French and Italian dining rooms in cottages, Dungeness crab and sand dabs from Monterey Bay, and tasting rooms around the village pouring Pinot Noir from the Santa Lucia Highlands. Meals are refined, early and expensive, and there is little casual choice.

In South Lake Tahoe food is fuel between days outdoors: casino steakhouses and buffets, brewpubs, taquerias and skiers' breakfasts along Highway 50. Local craft beer is the highlight, and many visitors end up cooking in their cabin.

Neither town is a museum destination, but Carmel has more to show. Mission San Carlos Borromeo, where Junípero Serra is buried, is one of the finest in California's mission chain. The storybook cottages, the artists' colony houses and Robinson Jeffers' Tor House make the village worth walking slowly.

South Lake Tahoe's sights come from the lake's past as a summer retreat for wealthy San Franciscans: the Tallac estates, Vikingsholm at Emerald Bay and a small history museum. Together they fill an afternoon at most.

Carmel is quiet by ten. An evening out means a wine bar, a long dinner and perhaps a nightcap in a hotel lounge, and there are no clubs at all.

South Lake Tahoe gives you a much better chance of a late night, almost entirely because of the casino towers just over the Nevada line. Their bars and gaming floors stay open all night, and a club or two fills up on busy weekends. There is also après-ski at the gondola base, but no bar district and almost no street life.

Both are superb outdoor bases, and the difference is sea against mountain. Carmel has the granite headlands of Point Lobos with sea otters and passing whales, the Big Sur coast within half an hour, and kayaking among the kelp of Monterey Bay.

South Lake Tahoe edges ahead because it works in every season. Summer brings the Desolation Wilderness and the Tahoe Rim Trail, autumn golden aspens, and winter deep snow on the slopes of Heavenly, Kirkwood and Sierra-at-Tahoe. Emerald Bay is a view to match anything on the coast.

Both offer pleasant rather than essential outings, but they differ in flavour. From Carmel the trips follow the coast and Steinbeck: Cannery Row and old Monterey, the Victorian streets of Pacific Grove, the Salinas farm country and the surf town of Santa Cruz, with San Francisco a long day away.

From South Lake Tahoe they lead into Gold Rush and silver-boom history. You can walk the boardwalks of Virginia City, stop at Genoa and Carson City, visit Coloma and the Amador wine country, or go to Reno for a bigger casino city.

Carmel's trump card is the Monterey Bay Aquarium fifteen minutes away, along with the tide pools at Point Lobos and Pacific Grove. But the cold, rough sea and the quiet, adult restaurants make it better for older children who love wildlife.

South Lake Tahoe works a little better for most families because children can play in the landscape itself. Summer means shallow lake beaches and paddleboards, winter means ski schools, sledding hills and the gondola, and cabins come with kitchens. It has nothing indoors for a stormy day, though, and the casino strip is best walked past.

Carmel is a square-mile village you can walk from end to end, while South Lake Tahoe stretches along a highway where winter shuttles and snow chains decide how you get about. In Carmel the walk from the Ocean Avenue shops down to the sand is steep, and the residential lanes are dark after nightfall. Point Lobos, Big Sur and the aquarium all mean getting in the car.

In Tahoe, the part you can walk is the small core around Stateline and the gondola base, with free shuttles up to the ski areas in winter. Beaches and trailheads are spread along the shore, summer weekend traffic crawls round Emerald Bay, and storms can close the passes from Sacramento and Reno.

Carmel is the place for an afternoon of browsing. It has an unusual number of galleries around Ocean Avenue and Dolores Street, and courtyard boutiques selling cashmere, jewellery and homeware. The shopping area is small and expensive, but a pleasure to wander.

South Lake Tahoe's shops are practical: ski and outdoor gear, rental stores, souvenirs at the gondola base and a supermarket for the cabin.

Neither is cheap, but Carmel is the harder on the budget. Its boutique inns charge luxury rates all year, dinner and wine tasting cost a lot, and the usual way to save is to sleep in Monterey or Seaside instead.

South Lake Tahoe is costly in peak ski weeks and high summer, and lift tickets are steep. It does offer real ways to save, though: casino hotels on the Nevada side discount midweek and in spring and autumn, and cabins with kitchens cut food costs. In both places the best scenery is free.

Carmel has the slightly stronger programme, though it is seasonal. It is built on the summer Baroque concerts of the Carmel Bach Festival, the Sunset Center and plays under the pines at the Forest Theater, with the Monterey Jazz Festival nearby each September.

South Lake Tahoe leans towards popular entertainment, with touring rock, country and comedy acts in the casino showrooms all year. In summer it adds Shakespeare on the beach at Sand Harbor and concerts at the Tallac estates.

Carmel is the better place to unwind, with misty mornings, still evenings and well-regarded spas at the Pebble Beach lodges and Carmel Valley resorts. It is made for a slow weekend for two by the fire.

South Lake Tahoe's spas are mostly attached to casino hotels and ski lodges. It does have something Carmel lacks, though: natural hot springs. The mineral pool at Grover Hot Springs is under an hour south, and the Carson Valley resorts are just over the pass.