Lake George or Montreal?

Lake George is the far better place to swim. The state beach at the southern end of the village is a broad, lifeguarded stretch of sand with the mountains across the water. Shepard Park and Bolton Landing have smaller beaches, and with a rented boat you can swim off the islands in the Narrows.

Montreal offers a summer dip, not a beach vacation: the filtered lake beach on Île Notre-Dame, the small river beach at Verdun, and the longer shore at Oka an hour west. Both places are freshwater with no surf, and in both the swimming season barely reaches beyond July and August.

At Lake George, eating is mostly pizza, burgers and pancakes on a deck where you pay for the lake view. A handful of more careful dining rooms around Bolton Landing serve Adirondack game and lake fish, and visitors who care about food usually drive to Saratoga Springs.

Montreal is the opposite: food is one of the main reasons to go. The city has its own dishes, from wood-fired bagels and smoked meat to poutine and spring sugar-shack meals. Add the Jean-Talon and Atwater markets and the bring-your-own-wine bistros of the Plateau and Mile End, and you could plan a whole trip around meals.

Lake George has one real sight, the reconstructed Fort William Henry, with its 1757 siege story and musket demonstrations, plus a small history museum in the old courthouse. The region's weightier history, at Fort Ticonderoga and Saratoga, means time in the car.

Montreal fills two or three satisfying days. There are the grey-stone streets of Old Montreal running down to the port, the blue and gold interior of Notre-Dame Basilica, the archaeology at Pointe-à-Callière, the Museum of Fine Arts on Sherbrooke Street and the great dome of Saint Joseph's Oratory.

Lake George's nights out happen on summer weekends: beer on the waterfront decks along Canada Street, loud until closing, and then quiet evenings for most of the year.

Montreal offers far more after dark. Bars serve until 3am every night of the week, and Boulevard Saint-Laurent mixes cocktail bars, dives and clubs. Mile End has quieter wine bars, the Village has its long-established gay clubs, and there are outdoor electronic events on Île Sainte-Hélène. The energy carries on through the winter.

Lake George puts you inside the Adirondack Park. The lake itself has more than a hundred islands and is made for kayaking, sailing and fishing, and the ridge hikes on Black Mountain and Tongue Mountain start from its shores. In winter, Gore Mountain, one of the biggest ski areas in the eastern United States, is about an hour away.

Montreal's outdoors is good for a city. Mount Royal rises beside downtown, a bike path runs along the Lachine Canal, and there is even river surfing below the Lachine Rapids. The wilder lakes and slopes of the Laurentians, though, are an hour and a half's drive away.

The two are about equally well placed for days out, but the outings are different in kind. From Lake George every trip needs a car, and the best ones are about history and old resorts: the spa town and racecourse at Saratoga Springs, Fort Ticonderoga above Lake Champlain, Lake Placid's Olympic venues and the small Vermont towns.

From Montreal you can take the train to Ottawa for the Parliament buildings and national museums, or drive to the villages, covered bridges and cider route of the Eastern Townships. Quebec City is the trip everyone wants, but it works better with a night there.

Both work well with children, in different ways. Lake George is a classic summer resort built around kids: the Great Escape theme park, gentle lifeguarded water at the state beach, paddlewheel steamboats and mini golf on Canada Street. Most of it shuts outside the summer, and you need a car.

Montreal suits a more curious kind of family city break. The Biodome, Insectarium and Botanical Garden sit together at the Olympic Park, and the Science Centre is in the Old Port. It works for more of the year, although deep winter cold makes outings with small children hard work.

At Lake George you can walk the whole village in minutes, and seasonal trolleys run to Glens Falls. Beyond that, the western shore, the trailheads and every day trip need a car, and summer parking in the village is a chore.

Montreal is far easier to manage without a car. The four-line metro reaches the Olympic Park and the islands, bike lanes and bike-share connect the central districts, and in winter the underground network keeps you out of the cold.

Shopping at Lake George means T-shirts and fudge on Canada Street, the outlet centres on Route 9, and a few shops selling Adirondack crafts, maple syrup and balsam pillows. Montreal is a real city to browse, with department stores and malls on Rue Sainte-Catherine, luxury shops around the Golden Square Mile, and independent Quebec designers, vintage and record shops in the Plateau, Mile End and Saint-Henri. Neither is worth the journey for shopping alone, but Montreal gives you far more to discover.

Neither is a cheap trip, but Montreal goes slightly further on the same budget. Lake George in July and August charges full American resort rates for lakefront rooms, and boat rental, restaurants and theme park tickets add up quickly. Older motels on Route 9, cottages with kitchens, free beaches and trails, and staying in Glens Falls all help.

In Montreal, hotels cost what they do in other North American cities and drinks are expensive. Casual eating, bring-your-own-wine bistros, reasonably priced public transport and free festival concerts make up for some of that, and you don't need a car. The cheap times also differ: weekdays and late autumn at the lake, winter in the city.

At Lake George, live performance is a summer extra: free concerts by the water in Shepard Park, a jazz weekend in September, an August chamber music festival and summer theatre. For orchestras and big acts, people drive to the amphitheatre at Saratoga.

Montreal has performances all year. The symphony, the opera and Les Grands Ballets play at Place des Arts, French-language theatre is strong, and the city's contemporary circus grows out of the National Circus School and TOHU. Every summer the International Jazz Festival turns the Quartier des Spectacles into an open-air stage.

At Lake George, rest means a lakeside cottage, an early morning on the water or a spa at one of the grand resort hotels near Bolton Landing, well away from the arcades and summer traffic of the village. The nearest bathing tradition is the historic mineral baths in Saratoga Springs.

Montreal has a bathing culture of its own in the Nordic spa: hot pools, saunas and cold plunges, taken all year on Nuns' Island or aboard a converted ferry in the Old Port, with larger forest spas in the Laurentians. Add slow café mornings and picnics in Parc La Fontaine, and Montreal is the more restful stay.