Detroit or Myrtle Beach?

This is the clearest gap between the two. Myrtle Beach sits on the Grand Strand, a long run of flat, pale sand with a shallow, warm Atlantic that you can stay in for hours. You can choose busy central blocks near the boardwalk or quieter, dune-backed stretches at Surfside and Garden City.

Detroit offers a small beach on Belle Isle and the calm, lawn-backed lakeshore at Lake St. Clair Metropark. The swimming season there lasts only a few summer weeks, so a swim is a pleasant extra rather than part of the plan.

Detroit is the better place to eat, mainly because of its communities. It has chilli-topped Coney dogs at old diner counters, square Detroit-style pizza and Saturdays at Eastern Market. Dearborn's Lebanese and Yemeni bakeries and grills are among the best of their kind in the country, and Mexicantown and Hamtramck add more.

Myrtle Beach's strip runs on seafood buffets, pancake houses and chains. The rewarding meals are fresh shrimp and flounder in Murrells Inlet and Calabash-style fried seafood over the state line. In both places the best food needs a drive, but Detroit gives you far more to drive to.

Detroit is far ahead here. The Detroit Institute of Arts alone, with Rivera's Detroit Industry murals filling a courtyard, outweighs anything on the Grand Strand. Add the Motown Museum, the Charles H. Wright Museum, a full day at the Henry Ford and Greenfield Village, and the Guardian and Fisher buildings.

Myrtle Beach is a twentieth-century resort with little history on show. Brookgreen Gardens, with its sculpture among live oaks and its exhibits on the enslaved people of the old rice plantation, is a worthwhile half-day, and Atalaya is an unusual curiosity. Both fit into one day.

Detroit's nights have more substance, centred on the techno it gave the world. Expect warehouse parties and small, serious clubs where the music matters more than the look, plus cocktail bars and taprooms in Corktown and Midtown. The catch is that they are spread out, so a night usually means taxis between neighbourhoods.

Myrtle Beach is the opposite: loud, casual and packed into the boardwalk blocks and entertainment complexes in summer, then quiet in the off-season. Its one real local tradition is the shag, the Carolina beach dance, still danced in the old clubs of North Myrtle Beach.

Both sit on flat land, but Myrtle Beach has a little more wildlife to offer. Huntington Beach State Park has marsh boardwalks with herons, ospreys and alligators, and you can paddle the cypress swamps of the Waccamaw River or take a dolphin cruise from the inlets. Golfers have dozens of courses to choose from.

Detroit's outdoors are about parks and water: Belle Isle's woods and lagoon, cycling on the RiverWalk, and woodland trails in the surrounding metroparks, with good autumn colour. Its long cold winter cuts the season shorter than Myrtle Beach's summer humidity does.

Myrtle Beach has the stronger single outing in Charleston, about two hours away, with its antebellum streets and harbour forts. It makes a long day but repays the drive. Georgetown's old port and the quiet beach village of Pawleys Island are closer.

From Detroit the options are pleasant rather than memorable: leafy Ann Arbor, the excellent art museum in Toledo, Bavarian-themed Frankenmuth, or Windsor across the river with a passport. From either base you need a car for almost all of them.

Myrtle Beach is built around the family vacation and shows it. Gentle surf and wide sand suit small children, resort hotels come with lazy rivers and kitchens, and the aquarium, wooden roller coaster, water parks and pirate-themed mini-golf fill any day off the beach. Spring break weeks are the ones to avoid.

Detroit has good things for children, notably the zoo with its polar bear tunnel and the steam trains of Greenfield Village. They are spread across the metro area, though, and winter removes most of the outdoor options.

Neither is easy without a car, but Detroit at least gives you a usable core. The People Mover loops around downtown and the QLine streetcar runs up Woodward to the museums of Midtown, so you can see the centre on foot and by rail. Dearborn, the zoo and anything further out still mean driving or ride-hailing.

Myrtle Beach stretches along about 100km of multi-lane highway with few pavements. Apart from a stroll around the boardwalk blocks or along the sand itself, you will drive everywhere, often in slow summer traffic on Kings Highway.

The two offer quite different kinds of shopping, and neither is large. Detroit's is small and independent: boutiques, vintage shops and Detroit-made watches, leather goods and print in Midtown and Corktown, plus local crafts at Eastern Market. For big brands you drive to a suburban mall.

Myrtle Beach goes for volume. It has two big outlet centres, enormous beachwear stores, and the more town-centre feel of the Market Common. The one local craft is the sweetgrass baskets sold along the coast road to the south.

Costs come out about the same, with the usual American extras of tipping, sales tax and a hire car in both places. The difference is in timing. Detroit's hotels are cheap for a big US city but jump on game and concert nights downtown. Myrtle Beach's oceanfront condos with kitchens are a bargain outside summer, but prices climb sharply in July and on long weekends.

Detroit is a real music city and the gap is wide. The symphony plays in the admired Orchestra Hall and the Detroit Opera has its restored house downtown. The Fox Theatre and the Fisher host big shows, jazz clubs and soul bands play most nights, and the free jazz festival takes over downtown at the end of summer.

In Myrtle Beach, a night at the theatre means polished country, gospel and Christmas revues, dinner shows with knights or pirates, and cover bands in the beach bars. These are enjoyable family evenings, but there is no orchestra or serious drama.

Detroit has no spa culture of its own, and the city runs on work, sport and music. The calmest hours you will find there are a slow walk along the RiverWalk or an afternoon on Belle Isle.

Myrtle Beach offers a bit more for anyone who wants to rest. Its oceanfront and golf resorts have massage and treatment rooms, and the quieter southern end around Pawleys Island slows right down in spring and autumn. Avoid the main strip in summer if you want peace.