Olympic National Park or Yellowstone?

Neither is a swimming destination, but Olympic at least has a coast. Rialto, Ruby and Second Beach are some of the most dramatic shorelines in the country, with sea stacks, driftwood and tide pools. They are for walking, though, not swimming, and the only real dips are in Lake Crescent or Lake Quinault on a warm afternoon.

Yellowstone is far from any sea. Its lake stays dangerously cold, and its thermal pools would scald you. A quick plunge in the Firehole River or a commercial hot-spring pool outside the park is as close as it gets.

Olympic eats better, mainly because of its north-shore towns. Port Townsend has bakeries, seafood and a cider and farm culture, and the local Dungeness crab, Hood Canal oysters and smoked salmon give meals a sense of place. The west side, though, offers only diners and lodge dining rooms.

At Yellowstone, food is fuel in practice. You get lodge cafeterias, early-closing kitchens and gateway-town steakhouses, with bison burgers and huckleberry pie as the regional touches. Better restaurants are in Jackson and Bozeman, both too far for an evening out.

Both offer about the same amount of heritage, but of different kinds. Olympic's is a town and a people: Port Townsend's intact Victorian waterfront, Fort Worden, and the Makah Museum at Neah Bay with its finds from the buried Ozette village.

Yellowstone's heritage is the story of the national park idea itself. It shows in the soaring log lobby of the Old Faithful Inn, the Roosevelt Arch and the stone buildings of Fort Yellowstone. For a large museum, Yellowstone visitors drive about an hour beyond the east entrance to the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody, with its Plains Indian collections and Western art.

Both are places to go to bed early. Olympic has slightly more going on: a few pubs, taprooms and wine bars in Port Townsend and Port Angeles keep going into the evening. Yellowstone's evenings end with a saloon or brewpub in a gateway town and an early night before dawn wildlife watching.

These are two of America's great parks, and the difference is in kind. Olympic's strength is range: glaciated peaks and wildflower meadows at Hurricane Ridge, rainforest in the Hoh and Quinault valleys, and a long, roadless Pacific coast where multi-day hikes are timed to the tides.

Yellowstone is about phenomena and big animals. It has most of the world's active geysers, the coloured terraces at Mammoth, and the yellow canyon of the Yellowstone River. Bison, wolves and grizzlies live in open valleys where you can actually watch them, rather than glimpse them through trees.

Olympic gives you more good reasons to leave the park. A ferry from Port Angeles reaches Victoria, with its harbour and parliament buildings, in about an hour and a half, so bring a passport. Port Townsend, Whidbey Island and Sequim's lavender farms are all close too.

At Yellowstone, most people spend every day inside the park. Jackson, Cody, Bozeman and the Beartooth Highway to Red Lodge are each worthwhile, but each is a long drive for a single stop.

Children do well in both, in different ways. On the peninsula they get tide pools, elk in the Hoh valley and easy walks such as the Hall of Mosses, with a lakeside cabin as a calm base. The catch is cold, rough sea and rain gear even in summer.

Yellowstone gives children more drama. Old Faithful erupts on schedule, mud pots bubble and there is a Junior Ranger badge to earn. In return, parents must watch them closely near scalding ground and wandering bison, and cope with full car parks and long drives.

Both need a car, but Olympic is easier to drive. Highway 101 runs around the park with light traffic. Distances are long, so splitting your stay between the north and west sides saves the most driving.

Yellowstone's Grand Loop Road is slower and more frustrating. Speed limits are low, traffic stops for bison, and in summer car parks fill at Old Faithful and Grand Prismatic. From November to April most roads close to cars, and the interior can then only be reached by snowcoach or snowmobile.

There is little to buy at either. Olympic's best is browsing Port Townsend's galleries, antique and book shops, with lavender from Sequim and Native carvings from the coast. Around Yellowstone the more distinctive finds are the cowboy boots, hats and wildlife bronzes of Cody and Jackson.

Neither is cheap in summer, but the peninsula is easier to do on less money. Campsites are plentiful, and ordinary motels in Port Angeles, Sequim and Forks make sensible bases.

Yellowstone's lodges and gateway motels charge high rates because so many visitors want the same beds at the same time, and Jackson nearby is very expensive. Camping, picnic lunches and a spring or autumn visit are the ways to bring the cost down.

Olympic has more live music, almost all of it in Port Townsend. Fort Worden's long-running summer workshops and festivals bring jazz, blues and old-time fiddle, and the town also has a small professional theatre.

Yellowstone's entertainment is more Western. There is the nightly summer rodeo in Cody and family musicals in West Yellowstone, while the Grand Teton Music Festival offers summer classical concerts, though only for visitors staying near Jackson.

Olympic is the easier place to unwind. The Sol Duc pools let you soak in mineral water at the end of a forest road. Lakeside lodges, long quiet evenings and valleys without phone signal do the rest.

In Yellowstone the steaming springs are far too hot to enter, so soaking means driving out to pools near Gardiner or in Paradise Valley. The busy summer loop leaves stillness to early mornings, the backcountry or the autumn months.