Hue or Siem Reap?

Hue has beaches within reach and Siem Reap has none. From Hue, Thuan An is a short ride to a plain stretch of family sand, and Lang Co, over an hour south, has a curve of sand between lagoon and sea that makes a proper day out from spring through summer.

Siem Reap sits beside the muddy Tonle Sap, which nobody swims in, and the coast is most of a day away. Here the water you get is a hotel pool, which you will be glad of in the heat.

Hue is the better place to eat if you travel for local cooking. Its spicy, salty cuisine comes from the old royal kitchens, so you get bun bo Hue, saucer-sized banh beo, clam rice from the river and a strong Buddhist vegetarian tradition, all cheap and served on plastic stools.

Siem Reap has fish amok, morning num banh chok and roadside grills, and it has more variety in its restaurants: a few kitchens rework Khmer ingredients as tasting menus, and social enterprises train young cooks. The catch is that the centre is full of pizza and backpacker menus, so the good meals take a tuk-tuk ride to find.

Both are old royal capitals, but Angkor puts Siem Reap ahead. Angkor Wat, the faces of the Bayon and the tree-split galleries of Ta Prohm spread across a forest park so large that three days only cover the main circuits.

Hue's Nguyen citadel and the tombs of Tu Duc, Minh Mang and Khai Dinh are younger and smaller, but they are moving in their own way, with restored halls standing beside ground still scarred by war. Two or three days does them justice, and the riverside pagoda of Thien Mu is easy to add.

Siem Reap is livelier after dark. Pub Street and the lanes around it fill every night with cheap beer, cocktail buckets and music, open late, and there are quieter bars along the river for a calmer drink.

Hue has a smaller backpacker strip on the south bank and street-side beer places where locals drink, but evenings mostly mean a riverside walk or the night market, and the town is asleep before midnight. Neither has a club scene.

Hue has the more varied countryside. You can cycle through rice fields and garden villages along the Perfume River, take a boat out among the fish traps of the huge Tam Giang lagoon, climb into the cool forest of Bach Ma or ride the Hai Van Pass where the mountains meet the sea.

Siem Reap is flat paddy and sugar palm country. Its best outings are by boat to the flooded forest and the bird colonies of Prek Toal, with forest walks on Phnom Kulen and at Kbal Spean further out.

The two are about level for day trips, but the outings are very different. From Hue they are about war history and the coast: the Vinh Moc tunnels and other sites of the old Demilitarised Zone to the north, and the Hai Van Pass, Lang Co and Da Nang to the south, with Hoi An usually the next stop rather than a return trip.

From Siem Reap they are mostly more temples, such as the fine carving of Banteay Srei and the collapsed, overgrown Beng Mealea, plus trips to the stilt villages on the Tonle Sap. There are no towns within comfortable reach.

Neither is built for children, and both suit older ones best. Hue is gentler, with lighter traffic, riverside parks, dragon boat rides and room to roam in the citadel grounds.

Siem Reap offers more adventure, with scrambling through root-tangled ruins and boat trips to stilt villages, and cheap family rooms with a pool make the hot afternoons easier. Both are hard on small children in the heat, and Siem Reap's steep temple steps and chaotic traffic add to the strain.

Hue is easier to get around on your own. The hotel streets, the riverside and the citadel are close together on flat ground, and a bicycle or cyclo handles most of it, though you will need a taxi, a driver or a boat for the tombs upriver.

Siem Reap's centre is small too, but broken pavements and heat mean you end up taking tuk-tuks for nearly everything, and Angkor is done with a hired driver or by bicycle.

Siem Reap has the better shopping, mainly because of its artisan workshops. You can watch silk weaving, stone carving and lacquerwork, the quality is high, and there are a few boutiques selling homewares and clothes made in Cambodia, along with the Old Market and the night markets.

Hue's shopping is more workaday and centres on Dong Ba market. Its own souvenirs are worth looking for, though: conical hats with poems hidden in the leaves, sesame candy and incense from Thuy Xuan.

Both are very cheap, and Hue is cheaper still. Rooms, stall food and cyclos cost next to nothing, and the only real extras are the citadel and tomb tickets.

In Siem Reap the Angkor pass is a large single cost on a short stay, and the restaurants and boutique hotels aimed at visitors cost noticeably more than local places. Daily life there is still inexpensive.

The two are about even here, and both build their evenings on old court traditions. Hue has the Nguyen court music performed in the citadel and ca Hue singing on lantern-lit dragon boats on the river, with the Hue Festival bringing more in its season.

Siem Reap has apsara dance, best seen at the smaller, more serious performances, and a contemporary Cambodian circus that mixes acrobatics, theatre and live music and is the more modern evening of the two.

Siem Reap is better set up for pampering. Massage rooms line the central streets, resort spas use herbal compresses and local ingredients, and yoga classes and small retreats are easy to find. The day falls naturally into dawn at the temples and a long afternoon by the pool.

Hue's restfulness comes from its calm: pagodas, the garden houses of Kim Long and quiet evenings, with inexpensive massage, a few riverside resort spas and the Thanh Tan hot springs and mud baths about an hour out.