Delhi or Leh?

Neither city has any swimming to speak of. In Delhi the Yamuna is no place for a dip and the coast is a flight away, so the useful water is a hotel pool in the hot months. In Leh the Indus and the high lakes are fed by snowmelt and stay icy even in summer, so the water is for rafting and for looking at. Beach lovers in either city fly on to Goa or Kerala.

Delhi is one of India's great places to eat. The lanes around Chandni Chowk and Jama Masjid serve stuffed parathas, nihari, kebabs and jalebi, and this is the city that gave the world butter chicken and dal makhani. Above street level, South Delhi and the grand hotels cover every Indian region and offer refined tasting menus.

Leh eats plainly and warmly: momos, thukpa, Ladakhi skyu and salty butter tea, with apricots as the local pride. The rooftop cafés around the Main Bazaar and Changspa feed trekkers well, but the food is filling rather than memorable, and much of it shuts outside summer.

Delhi has far more to see, with centuries of capitals layered on top of each other. The Red Fort, Humayun's Tomb and the Qutb Minar are all UNESCO sites, and Jama Masjid, the Lodi tombs and the imperial avenue from India Gate to Rashtrapati Bhavan can fill a week, though the distances between them call for planning.

Leh's own heritage is striking but small. The nine-storey palace modelled on the Potala, the mud-brick old town and the view from Shanti Stupa can be seen in a day or two, and its most remarkable monasteries lie outside the town.

Delhi has a real night out, even if it is scattered. Rooftop bars sit above the old reservoir at Hauz Khas Village, there are pubs under the colonnades of Connaught Place and bigger clubs and brewpubs in Gurugram, with a taxi between each. Leh has almost none: a late dinner on a terrace, perhaps a beer, and bed, since the cold and the early starts for the passes empty the streets early.

This is where Leh leaves Delhi far behind. The town sits in the Indus valley among bare, many-coloured mountains with the snowy Stok range above it. Treks through the Markha valley begin within a couple of hours, Khardung La rises above 5,000m, and the dunes of Nubra and the long blue Pangong Tso make overnight trips. In winter there is snow leopard tracking and the frozen Chadar trek.

Delhi offers Lodhi Gardens, Sunder Nursery and the scrubby Ridge forest, and good birdwatching at Okhla and Sultanpur in winter, but the heat, the monsoon and the smog limit time outdoors.

Both cities make good bases for day trips, but of very different kinds. From Delhi the outings are varied: the Taj Mahal and Agra Fort a short express train ride away, the Krishna pilgrimage towns of Mathura and Vrindavan, and the hilltop fort at Neemrana on the Rajasthan road.

From Leh the choice is narrower but extraordinary. A string of monasteries runs along the Indus, from Thiksey and Hemis to the thousand-year-old painted temples of Alchi, and you reach them by hired car rather than by train.

Delhi is the easier of the two with children, though still demanding. The National Rail Museum's steam engines, the zoo, the science centre and the water parks in Noida and Gurugram give children something to look forward to, and late winter brings clearer air.

Leh is much harder going. The single flight up to altitude is a real health risk for young children, the outings are long mountain drives, and the town has nothing made for them. Only robust teenagers who want to trek or raft really enjoy it.

Delhi has the metro, a clean, air-conditioned network signed in English with an express line to the airport and stations near most monuments. The city's size and clogged roads still make every day a matter of planning. Leh's centre is small enough to walk, if breathlessly, but everything beyond it depends on union taxis, hired motorbikes or shared jeeps on slow mountain roads, and some passes close in winter.

Delhi is a marketplace for the whole country. Dilli Haat and the emporiums on Baba Kharak Singh Marg sell crafts from every state, Old Delhi has Khari Baoli's spices and Kinari Bazaar's trimmings, and Khan Market and Shahpur Jat stock Indian designers and block-printed homeware.

Leh's shopping fits into the Main Bazaar: pashmina, thangkas, turquoise jewellery, prayer flags and good trekking gear. Much of the stock repeats from stall to stall and the quality varies.

Both are cheap places to stay, and Delhi is the cheaper of the two day to day. Its street food, metro and auto-rickshaws cost very little, and only the grand hotels and imported drinks approach Western prices. In Leh, guesthouses, homestays and bowls of thukpa are inexpensive, but the fixed taxi-union fares, days of car hire, permits for the outer valleys and summer hotel rates add up quickly.

Delhi has a proper stage life. In the cooler months the halls around Mandi House and Lodhi Road put on Hindustani recitals and Kathak and Bharatanatyam dance, the National School of Drama anchors the theatre, and qawwali at the Nizamuddin shrine is free and unforgettable.

Leh has no theatres or concert halls. Its performance is the masked cham dance in monastery courtyards, at the Hemis festival in summer and around Losar. These are deeply moving if you can time your visit to one.

Neither city is truly restful, but for different reasons. Delhi wears you down with noise, traffic and winter smog, and the relief it offers is pampering: Ayurvedic treatments in the big hotel spas and quiet early mornings in Lodhi Gardens. Leh is calm and contemplative, with meditation courses and amchi medicine, but the thin air disturbs sleep for the first days, and it has very little spa culture.