Chattanooga or St. Pete Beach?

This is the widest gap between the two. Chattanooga's water is fresh: small designated swimming areas at Chickamauga Lake and Harrison Bay, and cool creek pools up on the plateau. They are good for an hour on a hot afternoon, not for a beach day.

St. Pete Beach is built around its sand. A long barrier-island strip of fine quartz faces calm, shallow Gulf water, Pass-a-Grille looks west into the sunset, and the less developed sands of Fort De Soto and Shell Key are close by. Red tide spoils the water now and then, but for a beach vacation the choice is clear.

Neither city is a reason to travel for food, and the real difference is what is on the plate. Chattanooga cooks Southern food: meat-and-three plates, biscuits, barbecue and catfish, with chef-led kitchens and craft breweries around the Southside and Main Street. St. Pete Beach eats from the sea, with grouper sandwiches, smoked fish spread and stone crab on a deck at sunset, but chain restaurants line Gulf Boulevard and the more ambitious cooking is across in St. Petersburg.

Chattanooga has much more to see, though it is still a city for two or three days. The Civil War ground at Point Park and Missionary Ridge, the Hunter Museum on its bluff, the old Terminal Station and the long Walnut Street Bridge give a visit real substance.

St. Pete Beach has the pink Don CeSar, the old cottages and small museum of Pass-a-Grille, and the Spanish-American War batteries at Fort De Soto. That covers most of it, and anyone who wants museums drives across the bay.

Both towns go to bed early, and the difference is the setting. Chattanooga goes out to breweries, cocktail bars and the short Station Street strip, where students and young locals fill the patios at weekends. St. Pete Beach gathers at tiki decks and beach bars for the sunset and a cover band, quietens soon after dark, and sends anyone wanting a later night to downtown St. Petersburg.

Chattanooga is clearly the better of the two for outdoor activity. Its ridges, sandstone bluffs and the Tennessee River Gorge offer climbing, hang gliding, mountain biking and paddling between wooded walls. The Ocoee whitewater and the canyon rim at Cloudland Canyon are about an hour away.

St. Pete Beach's nature is flat and coastal: kayak trails through the mangroves, seagrass flats, dolphins, manatees in the cooler months and roseate spoonbills. It is lovely from a paddleboard, but there are no hills and almost no hiking.

St. Pete Beach has the easier list because its outings are close. St. Petersburg is half an hour away and Tampa's Ybor City under an hour, with Tarpon Springs, Dunedin and Sarasota's Ringling estate for further days.

Chattanooga's big outings mean longer drives: Nashville and Atlanta at about two hours each, and the Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville a little nearer. Lynchburg and Sewanee are quieter options. You need a car for day trips from either town.

Both work well for families, but in different ways. Chattanooga keeps its attractions close to town: the Tennessee Aquarium and Creative Discovery Museum downtown, and on Lookout Mountain the Incline Railway, Ruby Falls and Rock City.

At St. Pete Beach the main attraction is the shallow, calm water and soft sand, with dolphin boats and shelling to fill the gaps, while the aquariums and Busch Gardens are an hour's drive. In both towns, summer heat means planning the day around the cooler hours.

Neither works well without a car, and each has only a small area you can walk. Chattanooga's is a proper downtown: the riverfront, Bluff View and the Southside, linked by the free shuttle and the Walnut Street Bridge. St. Pete Beach is one long, thin strip with a beach trolley along Gulf Boulevard, and Pass-a-Grille and Corey Avenue are easy to get around on foot or by bike.

Chattanooga has a little more to offer. There is Warehouse Row in its converted railway warehouses, the boutiques, galleries and outdoor-gear shops of Frazier Avenue, and a large mall for everyday needs. St. Pete Beach sells mostly swimwear and souvenirs, with a few boutiques on Corey Avenue and craft shops in Pass-a-Grille, and for anything more you drive inland.

Chattanooga is easier on the wallet. Hotels and meals cost less than in the big cities, and the trails and riverfront are free, though attraction tickets and a hire car soon add up.

St. Pete Beach costs more, especially at the beachfront resorts from February to April. Older motels a block back from the sand and the quieter late-summer months make it cheaper, and the beach itself costs nothing beyond parking.

Chattanooga has real stages of its own. The gilded Tivoli Theatre and the Walker Theatre host the Chattanooga Symphony and Opera and touring shows, a community theatre on the North Shore stages plays, and bars on the Southside book bluegrass and Americana bands. It is a modest programme, but enough for an evening or two.

At St. Pete Beach, live performance means a cover band or an acoustic set at a beach bar. The orchestra and the theatres are a drive away in St. Petersburg and Tampa.

Chattanooga is a town for being busy rather than resting. Pampering means hotel spas and a few day spas, and the calm it offers is small-scale: an unhurried hour on the riverfront or a porch in Bluff View between days of climbing and hiking.

St. Pete Beach is far easier to slow down in. The larger resorts have full spas and there are massage studios along Gulf Boulevard. Days settle into an easy pattern of a morning walk on the sand, a long afternoon by the water and a sunset people stop to watch. Pass-a-Grille is the most unhurried corner, especially outside the spring-break weeks.