Lake Placid or Quebec City?

Neither city is a beach destination, but swimming is easier in Lake Placid. Mirror Lake has a lifeguarded beach in the middle of the village, and the Saranac chain and the rocky pools on the West Branch of the Ausable give you plenty more places to swim.

In Quebec City the St Lawrence is too cold and fast for a proper swim, and people use the Baie de Beauport mainly for sunbathing and volleyball. To actually swim you drive out to Lac Saint-Joseph or Lac-Beauport. In both places the season covers only high summer.

Lake Placid eats like an American ski village: big diner breakfasts, brewpubs, pizza and burgers, and a few lakeside lodge dining rooms. Maple syrup and craft beer are about as regional as it gets, and some kitchens cut back outside the main seasons.

Quebec City has a regional cuisine of its own. With tourtière, pea soup, poutine and sugar pie, the spring feasts in the sugar shacks, and bistros in Saint-Roch and Saint-Jean-Baptiste cooking with Île d'Orléans cheeses, duck and cider, eating becomes part of the trip. The Marché du Vieux-Port gives it the market culture Lake Placid lacks, although restaurants inside the walls are hit and miss.

Lake Placid's sights are about sport. It hosted two Winter Olympics, and you can see the 'Miracle on Ice' rink, the ski jumps and the speed skating oval, plus John Brown's Farm just outside the village. That is about a day of sightseeing.

Quebec City has far more. Its UNESCO-listed old town still has its walls, along with the Château Frontenac, the Citadelle, Place Royale and four centuries of churches and convents. The Plains of Abraham lead along the clifftop to the fine arts museum. Plan on several days, not one.

A night out in Lake Placid means a beer in a Main Street brewpub or a lakeside hotel bar, at its busiest after a ski day, and bed well before midnight. There is nowhere to dance.

Quebec City gives you a real choice of evenings: party bars on the Grande Allée terraces, student pubs and taprooms along Rue Saint-Jean, and cocktail and wine bars in Saint-Roch. Clubs are scarce here too, but the bars stay open late and the university keeps a young crowd out, especially in summer and at carnival time.

Both cities are close to serious wilderness, but Lake Placid has the edge because it sits right on the edge of the High Peaks. Mount Marcy, New York's highest summit, is a short drive away, half-day climbs like Cascade and Mount Jo have big views, and Whiteface has the biggest ski vertical in the eastern United States. Summer brings paddling on the Saranac Lakes, fly fishing and rock climbing.

From Quebec City you reach the outdoors by short drives. Montmorency Falls is a quarter of an hour away, and the glacial valley of Jacques-Cartier and the ski hills of Mont-Sainte-Anne and Le Massif are within an hour. Closer in, there is cycling round the Île d'Orléans and skating and ice canoeing on the river.

From Lake Placid, most outings lead into the woods. Saranac Lake, the Wild Center at Tupper Lake and the arts village of Keene are close. Fort Ticonderoga, Burlington and Montreal are between an hour and a half and just over two hours away each.

Quebec City has better outings close by. The farms, cideries and old parish churches of the Île d'Orléans are twenty minutes away, the Huron-Wendat community at Wendake is on the city's edge, and the shrine of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré is along the north shore. The galleries of Baie-Saint-Paul in Charlevoix make a longer day. You need a car for most trips from either city.

Both are safe and good for children who love snow, so the difference is in the kind of fun. Lake Placid's is active and Olympic: public skating on the Olympic rinks, the elevator up the ski jump tower, bobsled rides at Mount Van Hoevenberg, the toboggan chute onto the frozen lake, and Santa's Workshop nearby.

Quebec City adds what a city can offer: an aquarium with polar bears and walruses, hands-on museum exhibits, a forest water park and the winter carnival. Its old town's stairways are much harder with a pushchair than a walk around Mirror Lake.

In Lake Placid the walkable part is the short stretch around Main Street and Mirror Lake. Almost everything else, from Whiteface to the trailheads, needs a car on winding mountain roads, and buses are few.

You can cover far more of Quebec City on foot, from the upper and lower towns to Saint-Roch, and buses with express lines fill the gaps. The effort here is climbing: the cliff means stairways, steep streets or the funicular, and all of them get icy in winter. A car still helps for the parks and the Île d'Orléans.

Shopping in Lake Placid is a single stretch of Main Street with outfitters, fly-fishing shops, Olympic souvenirs and Adirondack gifts such as balsam pillows. It is useful for gear and not much else.

Quebec City has more to browse, though nothing grand. There are craft workshops and milliners in Petit-Champlain, antiques on Rue Saint-Paul, and independent fashion and book shops on Rue Saint-Joseph. To take home, look for ice cider, Québécois cheese and Inuit art.

Lake Placid is priced like a resort. On top of lodge rates and meals come lift tickets, guides, gear rental and almost certainly a hire car. The free pleasures are hiking, paddling and lake swims, and self-catering cabins in the quiet weeks of spring and late autumn save the most.

Quebec City is the cheaper stay. Its best sights, including the walls, the Dufferin Terrace and the Plains of Abraham, cost nothing. Rooms in Saint-Roch or Sainte-Foy are cheaper than those inside the walls, and you can manage without a car, although tax and tip add noticeably to restaurant bills.

Lake Placid's live performance is mostly a summer affair. The Lake Placid Sinfonietta, with roots in the early 1900s, gives free concerts at the Mirror Lake bandshell, and the village arts centre puts on an occasional show.

Quebec City has a proper season of concerts, opera and dance at the Grand Théâtre, home to Canada's oldest symphony orchestra, and experimental work at Robert Lepage's Le Diamant. In July the Festival d'été puts international bands on outdoor stages across the Plains of Abraham. Most theatre is in French.

Lake Placid relaxes you through quiet: a walk round Mirror Lake, a lodge porch over still water, a fire on a winter evening, and massages and hot tubs in the larger lodges.

Quebec City has a bathing habit of its own, the Nordic spa: outdoor hot pools, saunas and cold plunges in the forest around Lac-Beauport and even in the old port, best of all when steam rises into the snow. Add slow walks on the Dufferin Terrace and café afternoons in Saint-Jean-Baptiste, and it is the better choice for a restful stay.