Nikko or Osaka?

Neither is a beach destination, but Osaka at least offers a summer swim. Suma and the beaches towards Wakayama are about an hour away by train and warm enough in July and August, even if the sand is coarse and the setting suburban.

Nikko is far inland, and its highland lakes are for boating and fishing, not bathing. Here, cooling off in summer means a hot spring or a hotel pool.

Osaka is the far stronger food city, and eating is half the reason to go. Street griddles of takoyaki in Dotonbori, okonomiyaki cooked at the table, kushikatsu counters and snacks at Kuromon Market run alongside Umeda's basement food halls and the refined kaiseki and sushi counters of Kitashinchi.

Nikko has a handful of distinctive dishes, above all fresh yuba from the temple cooking tradition, plus mountain soba and grilled river fish. Lunch spots line the shrine road and thin out by evening, so the memorable meal is usually the multi-course dinner at your ryokan.

Nikko has the more concentrated heritage. Toshogu, Rinnoji, Futarasan and Taiyuinbyo form one ensemble under ancient cedars, and the gold and lacquer of the Yomeimon gate make it the most richly decorated shrine complex in Japan, with the Kanmangafuchi Jizo statues and the Shinkyo bridge close by.

Osaka's history comes in separate pieces: the reconstructed castle on its original walls, Shitennoji and Sumiyoshi Taisha. In exchange it has proper museums, such as the Museum of Oriental Ceramics and the Nakanoshima galleries, and a modern streetscape in Shinsekai and Dotonbori that Nikko lacks entirely.

This is the widest gap between them. Osaka is famous across Japan for its friendly, noisy evenings: standing bars in Ura-Namba, DJ bars and small clubs in Amerikamura, tiny bars around Ohatsutenjin and whisky lounges in Kitashinchi, with people talking across the counter and staying out until the first train.

In Nikko the day visitors have gone by late afternoon and the main street goes dark early. An evening there means dinner at the inn and a hot bath, with a hotel lounge in Kinugawa at most.

Nikko is the place for landscape. The Irohazaka hairpins climb to Lake Chuzenji under Mount Nantai, Kegon Falls drops from the lake, and the Senjogahara marsh leads to Ryuzu and Yudaki falls, with autumn colour spreading down the mountains over several weeks and snow in winter.

Osaka itself is flat concrete, but the train reaches greener places within an hour: the waterfall trail at Minoo, ridge walks in the Rokko mountains above Kobe and wooded paths on Mount Ikoma. Those are good half-day outings, not an outdoor vacation.

Osaka is one of the best bases in the country. Kyoto takes under half an hour, Nara with its deer and great Buddha about forty minutes, and Himeji Castle and Kobe are both quick runs, with Koyasan's monasteries and Uji's tea houses further out.

Nikko's main outing is Tokyo, a long day at about two hours each way, plus Utsunomiya's gyoza, the pottery town of Mashiko and the thatched post town of Ouchi-juku. Beyond these the options are mostly mountains and lakes.

For a family, Nikko works best as a short stay of two or three days. Older children enjoy the boats on Lake Chuzenji, the waterfalls and the Senjogahara boardwalks, and the Kinugawa side adds ninja and samurai shows and a park of miniature world landmarks. The long shrine staircases, gravel paths and bus rides between sights are hard going with toddlers, though.

With Universal Studios Japan on the bay, whale sharks at Kaiyukan, Tennoji Zoo, Kids Plaza and the Expo '70 Commemorative Park, Osaka can keep children busy for a week, which makes it the far stronger family choice. Stations and department stores have lifts and baby rooms, and spring and autumn avoid the sticky summer heat.

Bus timetables shape a visit to Nikko. From the two stations to the shrines is about 2km of gentle uphill walking or a short bus ride. Lake Chuzenji, Kegon Falls and Senjogahara all depend on buses up the Irohazaka road, which can crawl for hours on autumn foliage weekends, so this small area takes longer to cover than you would expect.

Getting around is far quicker in Osaka, where one IC card and a few lines do most of the work. The Midosuji subway runs north to south through Umeda, Namba and Tennoji, the JR loop fills in the rest, and the same card works on trains to Kyoto, Nara and Kobe. The flat streets suit cycling, and the only real headache is changing lines inside the underground maze of Umeda.

Osaka is a proper shopping city. It has the covered Shinsaibashi-suji arcade, generations-old department stores in Umeda, flagships along Midosuji, vintage shops in Amerikamura, electronics and anime in Den Den Town and kitchen knives on Doguyasuji.

Nikko has a single street of souvenir and food shops. Its worthwhile buys are Nikko-bori wood carving, straw-soled Nikko geta and packaged yuba, while anything in fashion or design will have to wait for Tokyo.

Day to day, the two cost about the same, but the spending goes in different places. In Nikko, meals, buses and shrine entry are modest and there are plain guesthouses, but the classic ryokan stay with dinner and breakfast, especially at the lake or in foliage season, takes most of the budget.

In Osaka, cheap street food and izakaya keep eating costs down and many temples and parks are free. Here the larger costs are rooms at weekends and in blossom season, plus big tickets such as the theme park. Compact business hotels outside Namba and Umeda help keep it reasonable.

Osaka has a real stage life. The National Bunraku Theatre puts on full puppet-theatre seasons with English guides, Festival Hall and Symphony Hall host orchestras, manzai comedy fills the Namba theatres, and the Takarazuka Revue's home stage is a short train ride away.

Nikko has no theatre or concert life. What it has instead is the Toshogu festival in spring and autumn, when about a thousand men in samurai armour re-enact the shogun's funeral procession, with horseback archery. It is well worth timing a visit around.

Nikko is built for slowing down. Kinugawa's riverside inns, the milky sulphur springs of Yumoto by Lake Yunoko and open-air baths looking out on forest make the daily soak the centre of a stay, and weekdays and winter are deeply quiet.

Osaka treats bathing as an everyday habit, with neighbourhood sento and large super sento for a long evening in the pools, and Arima Onsen is about an hour away. The city around them, though, stays fast and loud, so calm comes in short moments rather than whole days.