La Fortuna or San Jose, Costa Rica?

Neither place is a beach destination. Both sit well inland, so for sand you'll be on a drive. San Jose has the slightly easier run to the Pacific at Jaco or Puntarenas, about two hours away. From La Fortuna the Guanacaste beaches take over three hours, so most people add a few nights on the coast instead.

The difference is the swimming in between. La Fortuna has the cool plunge pool below its waterfall, calm river spots and corners of Lake Arenal. In San Jose, a swim means the hotel pool.

San Jose eats noticeably better. The lunch counters inside the Mercado Central serve proper casados to office workers, the valley's coffee is poured well in specialty cafés, and Barrio Escalante, plus the suburbs of Escazu and Santa Ana, give you modern and international cooking for an evening out.

La Fortuna has the same home-style sodas but little beyond them except steakhouses and pizza aimed at tour groups. Its one distinctive offering is the farm visit, tasting cacao from the bean and coffee grown on Arenal's volcanic soil.

San Jose wins easily, although it is not a grand city. The Teatro Nacional, built with coffee money in 1897, is a real jewel. Underneath the Plaza de la Cultura, the Pre-Columbian Gold Museum and the nearby Jade Museum show indigenous craft, and the National Museum fills the bullet-marked Bellavista fortress. One or two days covers it well.

La Fortuna has no historic quarter or museum at all. Its landmark is the white church with Arenal's cone rising behind it. For heritage you need a separate trip to the Maleku communities to the north.

San Jose has a real night out, mostly at weekends. You'll find craft beer and cocktails in Barrio Escalante and Barrio California, student bars in San Pedro, and the walled El Pueblo complex, where small clubs and salsa halls run late. Locals dance seriously, so it helps to know a few steps. Visitors take taxis between bars because downtown is best avoided after dark.

La Fortuna winds down early. There are a few bars and the odd band or small dance floor, but most people are up at dawn for a hike and spend the evening in a hot spring.

La Fortuna has the stronger nature, and it is right outside your door. Arenal's cone, the lava-flow trails, the 70m waterfall and the canopy bridges, where sloths, toucans and poison-dart frogs are easy to spot, are all a short ride away. Rafting on the Balsa and Toro, canyoning and paddling on Lake Arenal are close by, and Río Celeste and Caño Negro are within reach.

San Jose is impressive too, but you have to drive out through traffic to reach it. You can stand at the rims of the Poas and Irazu craters, walk the cloud forest in Braulio Carrillo, or raft the Pacuare, one of the best white-water rivers in the Americas.

San Jose is far the better base for outings to towns. Cartago has its great basilica and the roofless ruins of an earthquake-struck church. The Orosi valley holds the oldest working colonial church in the country, Sarchi paints its oxcarts, and coffee farms on Barva and Poas run tours. None of these is a highlight in its own right, but together they fill several pleasant days.

From La Fortuna, almost every outing goes into the landscape. The main places to visit are the topiary garden at Zarcero and the Maleku villages near Guatuso. Monteverde is better treated as the next stop than as a day out.

La Fortuna is the easier and more exciting place for children who like the outdoors. Hot-spring resorts have warm pools with slides, sloths and monkeys turn up on the forest walks, and horse rides and chocolate-making fill the gaps. The catches are the age limits on ziplines and rafting, the steep waterfall stairs and frequent heavy rain.

San Jose has the Museo de los Niños in an old penitentiary and the open lawns of La Sabana. Beyond those, its broken pavements and heavy traffic make the city tiring with children. The best family outings, to craters, waterfall gardens and butterfly farms, are all outside the city.

Both rely on taxis and cars, but San Jose makes it a little easier. Taxis and ride-hailing are everywhere, a small commuter train reaches some nearby towns, and the pedestrian stretch of Avenida Central links the main sights. The cost is traffic, which clogs the valley roads and makes trips out slower than you'd expect.

La Fortuna's centre is a few flat blocks you can walk in minutes. Everything you came for, though, is spread kilometres apart along the lake road or up the steep road to the waterfall. Buses are sparse, so you'll depend on tour transport, taxis or a hire car on potholed roads.

San Jose has more to browse. The Mercado Central is a warren of stalls selling coffee, spices, leather and herbal remedies, and the national craft market sells Boruca masks and miniature painted oxcarts. For clothes and brands there are the big malls in Escazu.

In La Fortuna, a few souvenir shops around the central park sell carvings, hammocks, Maleku crafts, rain gear and bags of local coffee and chocolate. That covers gifts and not much more.

San Jose is the cheaper place to spend your days. Soda meals, buses and city taxis cost little, and hotels are noticeably cheaper than in the tourist areas. Sit-down dining in Escalante and imported goods will still add up.

La Fortuna's basics are fair, but the reason you go there is expensive. Hot-spring resorts, rafting, canyoning, ziplines and lodges with volcano views are all priced for foreign visitors. The free river hot spring and walking the trails without a guide help, but a stay packed with excursions costs more than a few days in the capital.

Only San Jose has a stage worth planning an evening around. The National Symphony Orchestra plays much of the year under the gilded ceiling of the Teatro Nacional, the Teatro Melico Salazar puts on dance and folk shows, and you can find salsa bands and small jazz and rock venues in San Pedro and Escalante.

La Fortuna has nothing comparable. The most you'll get is a weekend band in a bar or a folkloric dance show with dinner.

This is La Fortuna's strongest suit and San Jose's weakest. The heat under Arenal feeds a chain of thermal springs, from large resorts with terraced pools at different temperatures set in rainforest to a free stretch of warm river by the road. Add spa treatments, open-air yoga and lodges where all you hear is rain and birds.

San Jose is a noisy, traffic-bound capital with hotel spas. To unwind, you have to go up to the hills above Escazu, out to the coffee-farm lodges, or to the simple thermal pools of the Orosi valley.