Detroit or Williamsburg, Virginia?

Neither is a beach destination, but Williamsburg gets you to the water more easily. The small strip at Yorktown is twenty minutes away, Chesapeake Bay beaches are close, and the long Atlantic sands of Virginia Beach are about an hour's drive, with warmer water and a season running from June to September. Watch for sea nettles in the bay in high summer.

Detroit's options are freshwater: the little beach on Belle Isle and the calm, shallow shore at Lake St. Clair Metropark. The swimming season is only about two months long, so it works as a summer afternoon out.

Detroit eats far better. Its own staples, chilli-topped Coney dogs and crisp-edged square pizza, sit alongside the Saturday stalls of Eastern Market and modern restaurants and breweries in Corktown and Midtown. The real draw is the communities: Dearborn's Arab American bakeries and coffee houses, Mexicantown and Hamtramck's Polish bakeries.

Williamsburg keeps to Virginia classics such as ham biscuits, peanut soup, crab cakes and bay oysters, plus a few bistros on Merchants Square. Its candlelit tavern dinners are more about the setting than the cooking, and Richmond Road is mostly pancake houses and chains.

Both are strong, in different ways. Detroit spreads its culture across a big city: the Beaux-Arts Detroit Institute of Arts with Rivera's industry murals, the Charles H. Wright and Motown museums, the Art Deco Guardian Building, and a full day at the Henry Ford museum and Greenfield Village in Dearborn.

Williamsburg is a single, absorbing subject. Its restored colonial capital, with costumed tradespeople along Duke of Gloucester Street, the Governor's Palace and the Wren Building, takes two or three days to explore, while Detroit's sights are separated by long, uneven stretches.

Detroit is the only one of the two with a real night out. As the birthplace of techno it has serious small clubs and warehouse parties, plus cocktail bars, taprooms and casino bars, though you will be taking taxis between neighbourhoods.

In Williamsburg the evening usually ends with a tavern dinner or a ghost walk, with student pubs near the college in term time. Anything livelier means driving to Norfolk or Richmond.

Both sit on flat ground, and both offer water and parks rather than scenery. Detroit has Olmsted's Belle Isle, the RiverWalk and a ring of metroparks with wetlands and autumn colour. Williamsburg has quiet Tidewater marsh and forest, the traffic-free Colonial Parkway, the paved Capital Trail from Jamestown, and kayaking on creeks where ospreys and bald eagles fish.

The seasons are what really differ. Detroit's outdoors belong to summer and early autumn, while Williamsburg's are best in spring and autumn, when summer heat and mosquitoes ease off.

Williamsburg has the stronger excursions because they extend its main story. Jamestown and Yorktown are each under half an hour away, and the James River plantations and Richmond's capitol and Civil War sites are within easy reach.

From Detroit the trips are pleasant but unconnected: leafy Ann Arbor, Bavarian-style Frankenmuth, Toledo's art museum, Canada across the river and the Cedar Point coasters at the edge of a day out. From either base you need a car.

Williamsburg is built for families. Busch Gardens has coasters for older children and gentle rides for small ones, Water Country USA is close by, and history turns hands-on with fife-and-drum parades, a blacksmith to question and replica ships at Jamestown to climb aboard. Restaurants are used to children, and motels with pools are everywhere.

Detroit has good pieces, including the large zoo in Royal Oak, the Michigan Science Center and the steam trains at Greenfield Village. They are spread across the metro area, though, and winter removes most of the outdoor options.

In both places you will mostly drive, and the differences are in what you can do without a car. Detroit has two light rail options, the People Mover around downtown and the QLine up Woodward, which together reach the stadiums, theatres and Midtown museums. Dearborn, the zoo and everything beyond still need a car or ride-hailing.

Williamsburg has no transit to speak of, but its main sight is a flat, partly car-free district you can cross on foot in about twenty minutes, and Amtrak stops near the centre.

Both offer modest shopping, but of different kinds. Detroit is good for independent makers, with Detroit-made watches, leather and vintage in Midtown and Corktown, while big brands mean a drive to a suburban mall.

Williamsburg's speciality is reproduction colonial craft, such as pewter, pottery and hand-printed books, along with Merchants Square gift shops and an outlet centre on Richmond Road. Neither has a main shopping street worth an afternoon.

Detroit is the cheaper trip. Hotel rooms undercut most big American cities, Coney dogs and Middle Eastern meals are inexpensive, and the streetcar costs little.

Williamsburg's motels are reasonable outside peak weeks, but the admission fees for Colonial Williamsburg, Jamestown, Yorktown and the theme parks add up quickly, so combination passes are worth looking at. In both places, budget for tips, sales tax and a hire car.

Detroit wins easily. The symphony plays in the much-admired Orchestra Hall, the opera has a restored downtown house, the 1920s Fox Theatre and the Fisher Theatre host big shows, and long-established jazz clubs, the free Labor Day jazz festival and Motown and soul roots mean live bands most nights.

Williamsburg's performances belong to its period setting: candlelit recitals, fife-and-drum corps and colonial theatre, plus college concerts in term time. For an orchestra or opera you would have to drive to Richmond or Norfolk.

Neither city has a bathing tradition, and in both a spa means one attached to a hotel or resort, so the difference lies in what surrounds it. In Detroit, calm is something you carve out between other plans: a treatment booked around a ballgame or a concert, then an hour by the river before the evening picks up again. The city is at its best when you are busy, and a trip built around rest would leave most of it unused.

Williamsburg makes slowing down the default rather than the exception. The historic inn and the golf resorts on the James River are made for staying put, with pools and treatments close to the Historic Area. Once the theme-park crowds are behind you, the town goes still in the evenings, with none of the pull of a downtown game or concert night.