Fort Myers or St. Pete Beach?

Both look onto the same calm, shallow Gulf, but St. Pete Beach comes out ahead because its long strip of quartz sand runs right along the town. You can walk from the hotel to the water, choose between relaxed Pass-a-Grille and the quieter Upham Beach, or head south to the uncrowded dunes of Fort De Soto and the undeveloped sand of Shell Key.

Fort Myers has fine beaches too, but they lie on the barrier islands half an hour or more from town. Fort Myers Beach is the busy, bar-lined one, and Lovers Key and Bonita Beach are calmer. Its real draw is shelling on Sanibel and Captiva, which beats anything at St. Pete Beach for collectors.

The food is much the same in both places: grouper sandwiches, shrimp and stone crab claws in season, eaten casually at the water's edge, with plenty of chain restaurants along the main roads. What differs is where you go for something better. Fort Myers has a small cluster of independent kitchens and craft breweries in its River District, with more ambitious cooking towards Sanibel and Naples. At St. Pete Beach the sunset dinner on a deck is the main event, and keen eaters drive across to St. Petersburg.

Fort Myers has noticeably more to see. Edison's and Ford's riverside winter homes, laboratory and gardens fill a good half day, McGregor Boulevard is lined with royal palms, and the River District keeps a few streets of early twentieth-century brick. It still adds up to about a day of sightseeing.

St. Pete Beach has even less. There is the pink 1920s hotel that serves as the town's landmark, Pass-a-Grille's old beach cottages and small history museum, and the coastal batteries at Fort De Soto. Serious museums mean a trip across the bay.

Neither place is for late nights, and in both the evening winds down early. Fort Myers splits its nightlife in two. Downtown has rooftop and cocktail bars and a monthly art walk, and the pier on Fort Myers Beach fills with sunset crowds and spring-breakers in March. St. Pete Beach is more of a single ritual: tiki decks and beach bars with cover bands at sundown, plus a few livelier spots on Corey Avenue. For a proper night out, downtown St. Petersburg is about half an hour away.

Fort Myers has the richer wildlife. The Ding Darling refuge on Sanibel is among the best places in the country for spoonbills, herons and ibis, Corkscrew Swamp has a long boardwalk through old-growth bald cypress, and the Great Calusa Blueway leads paddlers through mangrove tunnels. In winter, manatees gather on the Orange River.

At St. Pete Beach, almost everything happens on the water: kayaking the mangroves at Fort De Soto and Shell Key, dolphin boats, fishing from piers and charters, and watching shorebirds on the flats. Both places are completely flat and too steamy in summer for much exertion.

St. Pete Beach is the better base for day trips. St. Petersburg's Dalí Museum and waterfront are half an hour away, Tampa's Ybor City is under an hour, and the Greek sponge-diving town of Tarpon Springs, Dunedin and Sarasota's Ringling estate are all easy drives.

Fort Myers has a quieter list: polished Naples, the island villages of Sanibel, Captiva and Boca Grande, the utopian settlement at Koreshan, and Everglades City for the Ten Thousand Islands. Sarasota is about an hour and a half away. From either base, you need a car for everything.

Both have the shallow, calm Gulf that suits small children, but St. Pete Beach is the easier family base. Many hotels have pools and step straight onto the sand. Clearwater's marine aquarium, Tampa's aquarium and science centre and the Busch Gardens theme park are all within about an hour.

Fort Myers keeps children busy with shell hunting on Sanibel, dolphin and manatee spotting, a science centre and spring-training baseball in March. There is no theme park, zoo or aquarium nearby, though, and Orlando is about three hours away.

You will want a car in both, but St. Pete Beach is easier without one. The town is a single strip along Gulf Boulevard with a trolley running its length, and Pass-a-Grille and Corey Avenue are easy to walk or cycle, so a few days of beach and dinner need no driving at all.

In Fort Myers, a car is essential from the start. Town, beaches, Sanibel and the reserves are spread across a sprawling county, buses are sparse, and in winter traffic backs up on the bridges to the islands.

Fort Myers has the more useful shopping, of the American suburban kind: an outlet mall and large open-air centres along the highway towards Estero, plus browsing among the galleries and shell shops of Periwinkle Way on Sanibel. St. Pete Beach sells swimwear, beach gear and souvenirs, with a few boutiques on Corey Avenue and craft shops in Pass-a-Grille. For anything more, you go inland to St. Petersburg or Tampa.

Neither is cheap, and restaurant bills and the rental car are the same in both. Fort Myers works out a little cheaper because you can stay in town or near the interstate at much lower rates than on the islands, and summer prices drop sharply. Bear in mind the Sanibel causeway toll and beach parking fees.

At St. Pete Beach, almost everyone wants to stay on the sand, and beachfront resorts are expensive, especially from February to April. Older motels a block back and the quieter late summer are the ways to save.

Fort Myers has a real winter season. The Barbara B. Mann Performing Arts Hall brings touring Broadway musicals, a professional repertory company plays in a restored 1908 theatre downtown, and a regional symphony gives concerts, though very little runs in summer. At St. Pete Beach, live performance means cover bands and acoustic sets in beach bars. For theatre, the Florida Orchestra or opera, you drive to St. Petersburg or Tampa.

Neither place has a bathing tradition, but St. Pete Beach makes unwinding a little easier. Alongside the resort spas, there are day spas and massage studios along Gulf Boulevard, and the day is built around a slow walk on the sand and the sunset. In Fort Myers, spas are almost all inside resorts. Its calmest corners are Sanibel and Captiva, where low buildings, bike paths and early nights set a quiet pace.