Jaipur or Leh?

Neither city is a place to swim. Jaipur has no coast or swimming lake, but hotel pools are common and become a welcome refuge in the hot months. In Leh the rivers and lakes are snowmelt-cold, so the water is for rafting and admiring rather than getting into.

Jaipur is by far the better place to eat. Rajasthani dishes such as laal maas, dal baati churma and ker sangri, morning kachori and lassi, and the sweet counters around Johari Bazaar and MI Road give the city a cuisine worth travelling for, even if it leans vegetarian and alcohol sits mostly in hotels.

Leh feeds you well rather than memorably. Momos, thukpa and skyu are warming after a day in the mountains, and the apricots are a treat, but the rooftop cafés of Changspa and Fort Road mostly serve trekkers' menus, and much closes outside summer.

Jaipur has much more to see. The planned 18th-century grid of the Pink City, the City Palace, the Hawa Mahal and the stone instruments of Jantar Mantar sit together in the centre, and the Amber Fort, Jaigarh and Nahargarh crown the ridges above, enough for three busy days.

Leh's heritage is compact but atmospheric: the nine-storey palace and the Namgyal Tsemo ridge above the mud-brick old town, Sankar gompa and the sunset view from Shanti Stupa. The museums are modest, and the town itself is done in a day or two before the monasteries further out take over.

Jaipur offers more of an evening, though not much: rooftop dinners facing the floodlit forts, hotel bars and a few lounges and clubs in C-Scheme that liven up at weekends. Leh has essentially nothing after dinner, with only a beer at one of the few places that serve it, and the cold and early starts send everyone to bed.

Leh is one of the great mountain bases, and Jaipur cannot compete. From Leh you can trek the Markha valley in Hemis National Park, drive over Khardung La above 5,000m, raft the Indus and Zanskar gorges, and go on to the dunes of Nubra or the blue length of Pangong Tso, with snow leopard tracking in winter.

Jaipur's outdoors is smaller and drier: the rocky Aravalli hills, the climb to Nahargarh, leopard safaris at Jhalana on the city edge and balloon flights over the forts. It works only in the cool months, when the semi-arid heat eases.

Leh has the better excursions, even if they are nearly all of one kind. Thiksey and Shey are under half an hour away, Hemis about an hour, and the thousand-year-old painted temples of Alchi make one of the most rewarding days out in India.

Jaipur's easy outings are varied and rural: the Chand Baori stepwell at Abhaneri, the painted palace at Samode, ruined Bhangarh and the printing villages of Sanganer and Bagru. Pushkar and Agra are tempting, but they mean long days on the road.

Jaipur is the easier of two hard choices for families. Forts with ramparts and passages, puppet shows and a Jhalana safari keep older children engaged, and a hotel pool and a driver make the cool season manageable, though the traffic and crowds of the old city wear everyone out.

Leh is a poor fit for young children because flying straight to about 3,500m brings a real risk of altitude sickness, and the outings are long mountain drives. Only robust teenagers who want to trek or raft will get much from it.

Getting around is work in both, but Jaipur is slightly easier. Auto-rickshaws, ride-hailing taxis and a car with driver cover the city and Amber, about 11km north, cheaply, and the bazaars can be walked if you can cope with the traffic and cows.

Leh's centre is small and walkable, if steep at altitude. Everything beyond it means fixed-fare union taxis, hired motorbikes or shared jeeps on long mountain roads, with some passes shut in winter.

Jaipur is one of India's great shopping cities and Leh is a modest bazaar. In Jaipur each old-city street has its own trade, from gems and silver on Johari Bazaar to lac bangles and quilts, with block prints, blue pottery and rugs made nearby and design boutiques in C-Scheme. Haggle, and be wary of gem sellers.

Leh's Main Bazaar has pashmina, thangkas, turquoise jewellery and decent trekking gear, but the same stock recurs from stall to stall and quality is uneven.

Both are inexpensive, and Jaipur stretches a budget a little further. Street food, thalis, rickshaws and even a daily car and driver cost little there, with only palace hotels and alcohol pushing bills up. In Leh, guesthouses and momos are cheap, but the fixed taxi fares, days of car hire and permits for the outer valleys add up quickly.

Jaipur has more to watch on an ordinary evening. Kathak, Kalbeliya dance, folk music and string puppetry turn up nightly in hotels and cultural venues, and Jawahar Kala Kendra and Ravindra Manch stage theatre and classical dance.

Leh has no stage of its own. Its performances are the masked cham dances of monastery festivals such as Hemis, deeply moving if your visit coincides, but absent the rest of the year.

Neither is a spa destination, and in both rest depends on where you stay. Jaipur's calm lies in the shaded courtyards, gardens and pools of heritage havelis, often with Ayurvedic massage and yoga. Leh offers silence, Buddhist meditation courses and amchi medicine, though the thin air disturbs sleep for the first days.