Livingstone or Victoria Falls?

Neither town has a beach. The Zambezi, with its crocodiles, hippos and strong current, is no place for a swim, so on both sides the lodge pool does the work.

The one difference favours the Zambian bank. Devil's Pool and Angel's Pool, the rock basins on the lip of the falls, are reached from the Livingstone side, so guests staying in Victoria Falls have to cross the bridge for them at low water.

Both towns eat mainly in lodges and a short run of restaurants aimed at visitors, and both have a stiff maize porridge as the staple: nshima in Zambia, sadza in Zimbabwe. In Livingstone the dish to look for is whole Zambezi bream, grilled or fried, and the best meals are dinners on a lodge deck above the river.

Victoria Falls leans more on game meat: kudu, warthog and crocodile grilled over open fires at large dinners with drumming, plus mopane worms for the brave. It also has the classic afternoon tea or sundowner on the terrace of the Victoria Falls Hotel, looking out to the bridge.

Livingstone has the real sightseeing. The Livingstone Museum, Zambia's oldest and largest, covers archaeology and ethnography and holds the explorer's letters and belongings. A railway museum keeps steam locomotives, and the main road still has its tin-roofed colonial buildings.

Victoria Falls has less to show. There is the bridge, completed in 1905 for Rhodes's Cape to Cairo railway and walkable with a small display, the Edwardian Victoria Falls Hotel in its gardens and the Big Tree baobab. Visitors there who want museums cross the gorge to Livingstone.

Both are early-to-bed places built around the sundowner on a cruise or a lodge deck, and neither has clubs. Livingstone has a little more after dinner: a couple of backpacker hostel bars with life in them, plus a handful of local pubs and taverns in town.

In Victoria Falls, the evening after dinner means hotel bars, a couple of pubs and the backpacker lodge bar. Elephants and buffalo move through town after dark, so you take a taxi between bars rather than walk.

Both towns share Mosi-oa-Tunya, the Batoka Gorge rapids, canoeing on the upper Zambezi and an easy run to Chobe's elephant herds. For the outdoors, choosing between them is about which bank you start from, not about quality. From Livingstone you can take a walking safari to see white rhino in Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park, or hike down to the Boiling Pot.

Victoria Falls has the rainforest path along the rim opposite the drop, and sometimes a lunar rainbow in the spray at full moon. Zambezi National Park, with lion, elephant and buffalo, starts at the edge of town, and Hwange is within reach for a longer safari.

For each town, the best day out is the other one, a short crossing of the bridge with border formalities at each end. From Livingstone you go for Victoria Falls town, its Edwardian hotel, its craft market and a second view of the falls. From Victoria Falls you go for Livingstone's colonial main street and its museum.

Mukuni village and Kasane, the gateway to Chobe, are within reach of both. Beyond them, the region offers wildlife rather than towns.

Neither town is easy with toddlers: both lie in a malaria area, the big thrills have minimum ages and nothing is built for small children. Victoria Falls is the simpler choice for families with children of about eight and up, because the falls entrance, the bridge and the main hotels are close together and operators collect you from the lodge.

Livingstone also works for older children and teenagers, with rhino walks and lodges with gardens and pools. But nearly everything is reached by vehicle from lodges spread along the river, so days with children involve more time in the car.

Victoria Falls is easier on foot. The falls entrance, the bridge and the main hotels are within walking distance of each other, and you can walk across the bridge into Zambia. Livingstone's centre is walkable too, but the falls are well out of town and most lodges are spread along the river upstream. Taxis, shuttles and operator pick-ups therefore handle almost every outing.

Neither town has public transport a visitor would use. In both, elephants on the roads mean no walking at dusk or beyond the edge of town.

Both offer crafts and little else, and bargaining is expected on both sides of the river. In Livingstone the better buy is bright chitenge cloth from the fabric shops, alongside soapstone, copper and beadwork.

Victoria Falls has a larger curio market strong on Shona-style stone sculpture and a few fixed-price gallery shops with better-made pieces. It also has more traders working the main road near the falls.

Livingstone is easier on the wallet. Local meals, minibuses, taxis and town guesthouses are cheap, and a stay that keeps to the town and the falls walkways stays modest. Victoria Falls prices nearly everything for international visitors, much of its food is imported and its river lodges charge safari rates.

In both towns, the activities, from rafting to Chobe safaris, are what make the bill large. Seeing the falls from both banks means paying two entrance fees, whichever town you sleep in.

Neither town has a theatre, concert hall or regular music venue, so performance on both banks means traditional dance. Livingstone's is more rooted in ceremony: troupes perform at cultural centres, sometimes with masked Makishi dancers, and the Toka-Leya people's Lwiindi ceremony is the main event of the year. In Victoria Falls, drummers and dancers perform at the big game-meat dinners and marimba bands play at hotels, as entertainment around a meal.

Livingstone makes rest easier to find. Its lodges line the upper Zambezi some way from both the town and the falls, so a quiet stay is what you get by default, and the rafting and gorge swings stay at a distance until a pick-up takes you to them.

In Victoria Falls the main hotels sit close to the falls entrance, where traders and tour vehicles keep the road busy, so a calm stay means choosing a lodge in a private concession upstream. Those lodges are very peaceful, and some have spa rooms open to the bush that use marula oil. Neither bank has a bathing tradition, so pampering on both sides of the river means a lodge spa.