Houston or Pensacola?

For a beach trip, Pensacola is in another league. Pensacola Beach and the Gulf Islands National Seashore are twenty minutes from downtown across the bridges. They offer miles of very white sand, low dunes and clear green water, and the sound side has calm shallows for small children. Rip currents on rough days are the main thing to watch.

Houston has to borrow its beach from Galveston, an hour's drive away. The water there is just as warm, but it is brown-green with river sediment, and seaweed sometimes washes up. It makes a pleasant day out, but not a reason to travel.

Both cities serve Gulf oysters and shrimp, but Houston goes much further. Its Tex-Mex and smoked brisket are local traditions, Vietnamese and Cajun cooking meet in the spring crawfish boils, and Bellaire Boulevard's Asiatown and the Nigerian, Pakistani and Salvadoran neighbourhoods of the south-west reward anyone willing to drive.

Pensacola keeps close to the water. Grouper sandwiches, royal red shrimp and Creole-leaning gumbo taste best at casual places on the bay, and Palafox Street has some decent modern Southern cooking. Beyond that the choice is narrow, and the beach strip has a lot of chains.

Houston has more to see, though almost all of it is indoors. The Museum of Fine Arts, the Menil Collection and the Rothko Chapel would justify a trip for art lovers, and Space Center Houston's Saturn V adds a uniquely American draw. Its historic fabric is thin, though.

Pensacola is the other way round. It has fewer collections but more sense of the past on the ground, with the colonial and Victorian houses of the Seville district, the brick Fort Pickens and the National Naval Aviation Museum, where you should expect ID checks at the gate. Two or three days are enough to see it all.

Houston gives you more choice. Montrose has its long-established gay bars, Washington Avenue and Midtown have busy lounges, and EaDo fills up around game nights, all linked by ride-hailing rather than on foot. Open-sided icehouses are the local style.

Pensacola's evenings centre on Palafox Street and the old Seville Quarter, where the crowd is local and includes plenty of young Navy personnel. On the island you drink in sand-floored beach bars. It's fun on a summer weekend, but there are hardly any clubs and the town goes quiet early out of season.

Pensacola is the better base for time outdoors. The national seashore's dunes, salt marsh and boardwalks bring you close to ospreys, herons and dolphins in the bay. Inland, the Blackwater River's clear, sand-bottomed water is ideal for canoeing, and divers head out to the sunken aircraft carrier offshore.

Houston's outdoor life is mostly about urban parks. You can run in Memorial Park, paddle on Buffalo Bayou or drive to Brazos Bend to see alligators. Its real highlight is the spring bird migration along the coast. Both landscapes are completely flat, and both are hard going on summer afternoons.

Pensacola has slightly more variety within reach. Mobile is an hour west, with antebellum streets, deep Mardi Gras roots and a battleship on the bay. Fairhope and Fort Morgan lie across Mobile Bay, and Seaside and Destin are along the coast to the east.

Houston's best day out is Galveston, where the Strand's iron-fronted buildings and the Bishop's Palace make a worthwhile historic stop. Further out, the San Jacinto battlefield, Washington-on-the-Brazos and Round Top's wildflower back roads are steeped in Texan history. Austin and San Antonio are too far for a day trip.

Both work well for children, in different ways. Houston is the place for big attractions. Space Center Houston, the zoo and miniature train in Hermann Park, and the Children's and Natural Science museums can fill several days, but you will spend a lot of time driving between them.

Pensacola is built around the beach. There are calm sound-side shallows for toddlers and condos with kitchens, plus the naval aviation museum, the Blue Angels, the lighthouse climb and Fort Pickens' tunnels for days off the sand. Families who want theme parks won't find them here.

You will need a car in both cities, but for different reasons. In Houston the problem is sheer distance, with freeways and rush-hour traffic between districts many kilometres apart. Of the METRORail network, the light-rail line from downtown through Midtown to the Museum District is the one a visitor is most likely to use. The buses reach far but move slowly, and outside downtown and the museums the heat and missing pavements make walking hard work.

Pensacola works on a smaller scale. Its downtown and historic district are pleasant to walk, and a free trolley runs along the beach strip in season. Even so, the beach, Perdido Key and the naval air station are separated by bridges and highways, and local buses are of little use.

Houston is a real shopping destination. The giant Uptown mall, with its skating rink and luxury houses, draws buyers from across Latin America, River Oaks has upmarket boutiques, and the Heights and Rice Village offer vintage and independent shops. It is also a good place to buy western boots and hats.

Pensacola has a few boutiques and antique shops on Palafox Street, a standard regional mall and swimwear stalls by the beach. Its Saturday market of local crafts and produce has a small-town charm that Houston's mall culture lacks.

Overall costs are much the same, but they rise in different places. In Houston, hotels are plentiful and reasonably priced outside convention weeks, and taquerias, barbecue and free museums keep everyday spending down. The car, parking and the bigger family attractions are what push up the bill.

Pensacola's prices follow the seasons. Beachfront condos are at their dearest in summer and on long weekends and drop sharply out of season, while rooms in town stay cheaper. The car hire is the cost most visitors forget to budget for.

Houston has one of the most complete theatre districts in the country. The Grand Opera and the Ballet share the Wortham Center, the Symphony plays at Jones Hall and the Alley Theatre stages plays year-round. In summer, the free Miller Outdoor Theatre and small rooms playing zydeco, blues and local hip-hop keep live performance going.

Pensacola puts its symphony, opera and ballet on one stage, the restored 1925 Saenger Theatre. That is impressive for a small city, but it makes for a pleasant evening rather than a reason to visit.

Neither city has a bathing tradition, but Pensacola is the easier place to unwind, mainly because of its pace. Outside the summer peak, quiet stretches of the island and Perdido Key are as restful as anything here. For pampering, you are limited to beach-hotel day spas and massage studios in town.

Houston has more spa choice, from Uptown hotel spas to Korean-style bathhouses in the suburbs. Freeways and long drives set the rhythm, though, and calm comes in short moments, such as an hour in the Rothko Chapel or an early walk in Hermann Park.