Palm Desert or Tucson?

Neither city has a beach, so in both of them swimming means a hotel or resort pool. The real difference is how far away the sea is. From Palm Desert, the Pacific beaches of Orange County are a long day out, about two hours over the mountains.

From Tucson, the nearest sea is the Gulf of California in Mexico, about four hours away, so it is a weekend trip. The only natural swimming close to Tucson is in the shallow pools that form in Sabino Canyon after rain, and they come and go.

Tucson is the better place to eat. It has a cuisine of its own: Sonoran Mexican cooking with paper-thin flour tortillas, cheese crisps and menudo, served in family kitchens along South 12th Avenue. Heritage desert ingredients such as tepary beans and cholla buds also turn up on menus.

Eating in Palm Desert means steakhouses and Californian bistros on resort patios. They are reliable but much alike. The real local flavour is out east in Indio, at the taquerias and in the date groves selling date shakes.

Tucson has far more history to see. It was a Spanish and Mexican settlement long before Palm Desert was built as a post-war resort town. In Tucson you can spend days on the mission at San Xavier, the adobe rows of Barrio Viejo, the Arizona State Museum and the huge collection at the Pima Air & Space Museum.

In Palm Desert, sightseeing takes a morning: the sculpture garden at the branch of the Palm Springs Art Museum and the galleries on El Paseo. For mid-century modern architecture you have to drive to Palm Springs.

Tucson has the livelier evenings, thanks largely to its university. You can walk between the dive bars of Fourth Avenue and the rooftops and small dance floors of Congress Street, and both are busy on term-time weekends.

Evenings in Palm Desert are quieter and older: wine bars and patio happy hours on El Paseo, mostly full of golfers and retirees. For a late night, you drive to a casino or to Palm Springs.

The desert scenery is a big draw in both cities, and Tucson has a little more of it right on its doorstep. Saguaro National Park lies on both sides of the city, and the road up Mount Lemmon climbs from cactus to pine forest. Tucson also has a small ski area, serious road cycling and well-known birdwatching.

Palm Desert has the Santa Rosa Mountains rising right behind the town, palm oases in the Indian Canyons and the tramway up to cool forest. Joshua Tree, with its granite boulders, is about an hour's drive away.

Most outings from Palm Desert begin twenty minutes west in Palm Springs, with its walkable downtown. Further out are the Temecula wineries, the pine-shaded village of Idyllwild for a cool summer escape and Salvation Mountain, the painted folk-art hillside near the Salton Sea.

Heading south-east from Tucson takes you into old frontier and copper-mining country, and the choice is wider. There are the Wild West streets of Tombstone, steep Victorian Bisbee with its mine tours, the artists' village of Tubac and the adobe ruins at Tumacácori. With Biosphere 2 under an hour to the north, you can easily fill a week with different outings.

Tucson has a bit more for children. The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum has mountain lions and hummingbirds in desert settings, and there is also a zoo, a children's museum, a planetarium, the giant aircraft and a western film set with stunt shows.

Palm Desert has one excellent attraction, The Living Desert, with giraffes and cheetahs. After that, families rely on resort pools and slides. Both cities need a car for every outing, and in both the summer heat is hard on small children.

You need a hire car in both cities. Tucson is slightly easier without one, because its Sun Link streetcar connects downtown, Fourth Avenue and the university, and that small core is pleasant to walk around in the cooler months.

Palm Desert has no real centre beyond a few blocks of El Paseo. It is a spread of resorts and gated communities along wide boulevards, and in the evenings ride-hailing fills the gaps.

Palm Desert is the better place to shop, as long as fashion and fine things are what you are after. El Paseo serves the wealthy winter residents who stroll it, so an hour or two there slips easily into a resort routine, and a big indoor mall covers the everyday American brands. For something with more character, Palm Springs, twenty minutes away, has vintage and mid-century furniture shops. Local crafts are almost absent, unless you count a box of Medjool dates from the farms.

Tucson has no luxury street and no major department store, but what you bring home comes from the Southwest and Sonora, such as Tohono O'odham baskets and pottery, along with the independent and vintage shops of Fourth Avenue. Its real occasion is the gem and mineral show each winter, when dealers fill hotels and tents across the city and serious collectors fly in for it. Outside those weeks, a shopping day here is pleasant but quickly done.

Tucson is the cheaper of the two. Its mid-range hotels are reasonably priced, and the taquerías and hot dog stands make eating cheaply easy. In Palm Desert, resort rooms are expensive through the winter and spring, and eating out generally means sit-down meals with tips.

Both cities share the same seasonal pattern. Rates fall sharply in the summer heat, and golf and spa resorts are expensive in either place. In both, a hire car is a daily cost on top of everything else.

The two are about level, but their offer is different. Palm Desert has one comfortable main stage, the McCallum Theatre, for touring shows and well-known singers, and nearby Indio hosts the Coachella and Stagecoach festivals for a few weekends each spring.

Tucson has its own institutions: a symphony orchestra, Arizona Opera and a resident theatre company, along with small music venues on Congress Street. It also has a deep mariachi tradition, celebrated at its annual conference.

Both cities are made for slowing down, and they do it in different ways. Palm Desert offers resort spas and long days by the pool. Half an hour away, the small spa hotels of Desert Hot Springs fill their pools straight from natural mineral springs.

Tucson has no hot springs and no public baths. Instead it has long-established destination spas in the Catalina foothills, with structured fitness, desert walks and meditation programmes, which suit visitors who want a more active kind of retreat.