Copper Mountain or Denver?

Neither place is for swimming, and both are a very long way from any sea. Denver at least has sandy reservoir beaches at Cherry Creek and Chatfield on the edge of the city and outdoor public pools for a hot day. At Copper the snowmelt lakes stay cold even in July, so a swim means a heated lodge pool or a hot tub.

At Copper Mountain the food is there to feed skiers: burgers and chilli in the mid-mountain lodges, pizza and pub food in the village, and a condo kitchen for many visitors. For a more interesting dinner, people drive to Frisco or Breckenridge.

Denver has its own food identity. It is built on beer from the taprooms in RiNo and around Coors Field, green chile smothered over burritos, Colorado lamb and bison, and a long stretch of Vietnamese and Mexican cooking on Federal Boulevard. It is casual rather than grand, but there is far more to find.

Copper Mountain has nothing to visit in this sense. It is a village of condos and lodges built around the lifts, and the mining-era heritage of the area belongs to Breckenridge and Leadville, not to the resort.

Denver fills two or three good days. There is the gold-domed State Capitol, the Denver Art Museum with its Native American collection, the Clyfford Still Museum, and the brick warehouses of LoDo and Larimer Square. If you want a museum on a snowy afternoon, Denver is the only real option of the two.

At Copper Mountain the evening ends early. Après-ski at the base of the lifts is busy for a few hours on winter afternoons, but the altitude and a day on the slopes send most people back to their condos long before midnight, and outside the ski season there is very little going on. For a later night you have to drive half an hour to Breckenridge's main street, then drive back over mountain roads in the dark.

In Denver, you can choose the neighbourhood that suits your mood, which Copper cannot offer. One night could be a game-night crowd in LoDo, the next a warehouse taproom in RiNo, a scruffy dive on East Colfax or a quieter local bar in Highland or South Broadway, and any of them carries on long after Copper's plaza has emptied. Neither place has much for clubbers, though: Denver's club scene is small, and Copper has none.

Both sit in front of the same mountains, but Copper Mountain is inside them. Its high bowls and runs graded by ability start at the lodge door, Vail and the other Summit County areas are a short drive away, and in summer the Colorado Trail crosses the resort itself.

From Denver the outdoors starts half an hour away, at Red Rocks and on the trails above Golden, and Rocky Mountain National Park is about two hours off. The range is wide and the city has dry, sunny days and riverside bike trails. For skiing, though, each day means up to two hours each way on I-70, a drive Copper visitors never make.

The day trips are about equally good but quite different. From Copper Mountain the options are short drives between mountain towns: Breckenridge's Victorian main street, silver-boom Leadville, Vail over the pass and lakeside Frisco. Denver is there too for a museum day if the interstate is clear.

Denver's day trips are more varied. Boulder under the Flatirons, Golden, Colorado Springs with Manitou Springs, and the brewery town of Fort Collins give it a range of college and Front Range towns that Copper cannot reach easily. Both share Georgetown and its narrow-gauge railway.

Both work well for families, in different ways. Copper Mountain is made for a family ski week. The village core is car-free, there is a children's ski school, and tubing, a mountain coaster and a trampoline centre fill the rest of the day. The drawback is the altitude of nearly 3,000m, which is hard on small children for the first few days.

Denver offers more for younger children who are not skiing. The zoo and the Museum of Nature & Science with its dinosaurs share City Park, and the Children's Museum, an aquarium and an amusement park are grouped by the South Platte. Easy mountain outings are an extra rather than the whole trip.

Once you have arrived, Copper Mountain is easier. Walkways, lifts and a free shuttle link its villages, free county buses run to Frisco and on to Breckenridge and Keystone, and a car can stay parked for days. Getting there is the hard part: about two hours by road from Denver airport, often in winter traffic.

Denver is easy to reach, with a train from the airport to Union Station and a flat, walkable downtown. Beyond the centre, though, it is a spread-out city. Red Rocks, the mountains and most day trips need a hired car.

Copper Mountain sells what skiers need: rental equipment, outdoor gear, sunglasses and resort-branded clothing. For more, people drive to the outlet mall at Silverthorne or the galleries on Breckenridge's main street.

Denver has real shopping. There is the upscale mall and the boutiques of Cherry Creek, vintage clothes and records on South Broadway, and Western boots and hats. Its large outdoor-gear flagship stores make it the better place to kit out before driving up to the slopes.

Copper Mountain is the more expensive stay, especially in winter, when lift access, slope-side rooms, equipment rental and resort meals all add up. A condo with a kitchen, or a room in Frisco or Silverthorne, eases the cost, and summer is noticeably cheaper.

Denver has normal big-city prices, with expensive downtown hotels and a hired car on most budgets. It is still easier to keep costs down there: stay near the light rail, eat at taquerias and breweries, and spend your days on the free parks and trails.

At Copper Mountain live performance is limited to bands on the village plaza on summer concert weekends and acoustic sets at après-ski. For anything more, people drive to Breckenridge's summer classical season.

Denver is in a different league. A summer concert at Red Rocks, between its two sandstone monoliths, is something people travel for. In town, the Denver Center for the Performing Arts has resident theatre, touring Broadway musicals, the Colorado Symphony, the opera and the ballet, and Five Points keeps its jazz tradition alive in small rooms.

At Copper Mountain, relaxing mostly means an outdoor hot tub with a view of the slopes, plus pools and massages at the resort athletic club. The quiet evenings and clean air help, but the altitude can disturb sleep for the first nights.

Denver has more choice: day spas, hotel spas and yoga studios in the city, and the historic mineral pools and steam caves of Idaho Springs under an hour away. Sunny parks add to its easy, unhurried pace.