Los Angeles or Moab?

Los Angeles has more than 100km of shore, from the Malibu coves to the South Bay volleyball beaches. The Pacific is cool, so swimming is brief or done in a wetsuit, but a day on the sand is easy to arrange.

Moab is high desert hundreds of kilometres from the sea. The nearest thing to swimming is a shallow creek pool, a reservoir or the motel pool after a hike.

Food is one of the main reasons to choose Los Angeles. Its immigrant communities cook at full strength, from Oaxacan kitchens in Mid-City to Thai Town and Little Ethiopia, and there is a serious chef-led dining scene on top. You'll drive across the basin to reach the best of it.

In Moab you eat to refuel. Main Street has big, casual plates of burgers, pizza and tacos, and there is no local cuisine to seek out. Utah's alcohol rules also make a drink with dinner more formal than you might expect.

Los Angeles has a modern, spread-out circuit: the Getty on its hilltop, LACMA and the Broad, the Huntington's library and gardens, and Hollywood's movie palaces and studio lots. It has no old city to wander, but the museums can fill several days.

Moab's town has a small museum and a morning's worth of sights. Its real cultural depth lies outside town, in the Fremont and Ancestral Puebloan rock art on the cliffs along Potash Road and Kane Creek.

Los Angeles is a strong city to go out in. It has guest-list clubs in Hollywood, the gay bars of Santa Monica Boulevard, downtown rooftops and Eastside dive bars. Bars close at 2am, and a night usually stays in one neighbourhood.

Moab has a couple of brewpubs full of bikers and rafters, and the town is mostly asleep by eleven. Its evening attraction is a very dark, star-filled sky.

Los Angeles has a lot of wild country for a city of its size. There are the Griffith Park trails, ridges in the Santa Monica Mountains, pine forest in the San Gabriels, surf breaks and boats out to the Channel Islands.

Moab is still a step above, because the landscape is the whole point of going. Arches starts at the edge of town, Canyonlands and Dead Horse Point overlook huge river-cut canyons, and Slickrock and the Whole Enchilada draw mountain bikers from around the world. Rafting, climbing and canyoneering are all close by.

From Los Angeles you can reach different kinds of places in a day: Santa Barbara's mission and red-tile streets, the ferry to Catalina, the Laguna Beach galleries and the Ojai valley. Traffic decides how far you actually get.

Moab's day trips are mostly more landscape. The towns nearby are small, and the most rewarding cultural outing is the long drive south to Edge of the Cedars and the stone towers of Hovenweep.

Los Angeles is built for a family vacation, with Disneyland, Universal Studios and Magic Mountain, the space shuttle at the Science Center, the La Brea fossils and the Long Beach aquarium. The hard part is the time spent in the car.

Moab works for a narrower group of families: school-age children who enjoy short arch walks, dinosaur tracks, gentle raft floats and Junior Ranger programmes. It has no attractions built for children, and the heat and cliff edges call for care.

Neither place works without a car, but Los Angeles gives you more options. Its Metro lines connect downtown with Hollywood, Pasadena, Long Beach and Santa Monica, and ride-hailing fills the gaps. The cost is long, jammed freeway drives between districts.

Moab's Main Street is easy to walk, and a bike path runs to the Arches entrance. Beyond that you need your own vehicle or a guided tour, and a high-clearance car for the dirt tracks to many trailheads.

Los Angeles is a real shopping city. It has the luxury houses of Rodeo Drive, streetwear and vintage on Melrose, independent shops on Abbot Kinney and serious flea markets at the Rose Bowl.

In Moab, shopping means a spare bike tyre, climbing gear, rock-shop geodes and some Navajo jewellery in the galleries. It has nothing in fashion or design.

Both are expensive, and Moab comes out somewhat lighter on the wallet. Its rooms are simple but priced like a resort in spring and autumn. It saves you money through cheap campgrounds, free hikes, a park pass that lasts a week and much lower winter rates.

Los Angeles adds pricey coastal hotels, tips and sales tax, parking and theme park tickets. Taco trucks, Koreatown meals and free sights such as Griffith Observatory and the Getty help a lot.

Los Angeles is one of the great music cities. The Philharmonic plays at Disney Concert Hall and, in summer, at the Hollywood Bowl. Opera, Broadway tours, Sunset Strip rock rooms, Leimert Park jazz and top comedy clubs run on most nights.

Moab's one highlight is its late-summer chamber music festival, with some concerts held in canyon grottoes reached by boat. For the rest of the year, expect a weekend band in a brewpub at most.

Los Angeles has a real bathing culture in the Koreatown bathhouses, with hot and cold pools, scrubs and heated floors, some open around the clock. Yoga studios and luxury spas fill in around them, though the traffic itself is far from restful.

Moab has only a few massage studios, most of them treating sore legs. Its version of rest is stillness: a red cliff at sunset, a quiet evening and perhaps a cabin up in the La Sals.