Palm Springs or Snowbird?

Neither city is a beach destination, and the sea is far from both. The difference is the water you do get. In Palm Springs the pool is at the centre of the stay through a long, hot season.

At Snowbird, swimming means a heated resort pool, or in summer a cold reservoir in the Heber Valley. Each has a strange salty lake nearby, the Salton Sea and the Great Salt Lake, that people go to look at rather than swim in.

Palm Springs gives you more choice: brunch on shaded patios, mid-range restaurants along Palm Canyon Drive, date shakes from the groves around Indio and honest taquerias further east in the valley. It is relaxed rather than serious eating, but there is some variety.

At Snowbird you eat in the lodges, on the base plaza or in the dining room at the top of the tram. The food is competent but has no local character. Most guests drive down to Salt Lake City a night or two a week for a change.

Palm Springs has a real draw here, and Snowbird has almost none. A day of driving or cycling past the mid-century homes of Twin Palms and Vista Las Palmas, Albert Frey's buildings and the Kaufmann House is time well spent. The art museum and the Agua Caliente Cultural Museum add depth.

At Snowbird, the concrete lodges built in 1971 are the closest thing to architecture worth seeing, and the canyon's mining past has left little behind. For Temple Square or a museum, you drive down to Salt Lake City.

Palm Springs gives you a night out, and Snowbird mostly does not. The long-established LGBTQ bars of Arenas Road, the drag nights and the retro cocktail lounges make a friendly, if small, scene. It winds down early, though, and empties in summer.

At Snowbird the evening peaks with après-ski on the lodge decks and is over by mid-evening, because the first tram matters more than a late night. For a proper night out you have to drive the canyon road to Salt Lake City or Park City.

Both towns are built around an aerial tram, but Snowbird's mountain is the bigger prize. Deep, dry snow, steep chutes and the link through Mineral Basin to Alta make it one of the great ski mountains in the country. In summer the Twin Peaks and Lone Peak wilderness, the wildflowers of Albion Basin and the granite climbing take over.

Palm Springs has striking contrasts of its own: palm oases in the Indian Canyons, pine forest at the top of the San Jacinto tramway, and Joshua Tree an hour away. Its limit is the summer heat, which restricts hiking to dawn or the upper mountain for months at a time.

Snowbird has the better day trips because two real towns are within easy reach. Salt Lake City has Temple Square and the State Capitol, and Park City has its Victorian Main Street. Midway, Sundance and Ogden's 25th Street complete the list.

Day trips from Palm Springs are smaller and odder: the film-set town of Pioneertown, the pines of Idyllwild, Salvation Mountain by the Salton Sea and the Temecula wineries. They are fun, but Los Angeles and San Diego are too far for a comfortable day out.

Each works for families only in certain ways, so the choice depends on the children. Palm Springs is a pool vacation with outings to the Living Desert, the tramway and the Air Museum, and it works better in the big resorts down the valley than in the adults-only boutique hotels.

Snowbird suits families who ski, especially teenagers and confident young skiers, and its car-free base makes children easy to keep track of. In summer the mountain coaster, alpine slide and ropes course keep younger children busy, though the altitude can tire small ones.

Snowbird is easier from day to day. Everything sits along a car-free base within a short walk, and many rooms open straight onto the slopes. Its weak point is the single canyon road, which jams on powder mornings and can close for avalanche control.

Palm Springs has a flat, walkable downtown and good cycling in the cooler months. The canyons, the tramway, the rest of the valley and Joshua Tree all need a car, though, and the buses are slow. The airport on the edge of town is a real convenience.

If you like mid-century design, Palm Springs is a real place to shop. The Uptown Design District has vintage furniture, lighting and clothing, and El Paseo and the Cabazon outlets are close by.

Snowbird has only the shops in its base area, selling ski gear and resort-branded clothing. For proper browsing you go to Park City's main street or the malls of Salt Lake City.

Neither is cheap, but Palm Springs leaves you more ways to save. Simple motels and supermarket picnics work at any time of year, and in the summer heat room rates fall sharply.

Snowbird costs what a major ski resort in the American West costs. Lift tickets, slopeside rooms and resort meals are all expensive in the peak winter weeks. Staying in Salt Lake City and driving up saves money but gives up the slopeside experience, and summer is the cheaper season.

Palm Springs has the busier programme. Drag cabaret and piano bars are the local speciality, the McCallum Theatre and the casinos bring in touring shows and well-known acts, and each April the Coachella and Stagecoach festivals fill the polo grounds in Indio.

Snowbird has summer concerts on its plaza, the bands of its long-running Oktoberfest and the occasional band at après-ski. The symphony, opera and theatre are all down in Salt Lake City.

Palm Springs grew up around a hot spring, and soaking is part of the place. There is the Agua Caliente bathhouse downtown, and the spa motels of Desert Hot Springs fill their pools straight from the aquifer. With dry winter sun and a slow pace, it is made for unwinding.

At Snowbird, relaxing centres on the rooftop spa above the main lodge, with hot tubs facing the canyon walls, and it is at its best after a hard day on the slopes. For a mineral soak you drive an hour to the limestone crater at Homestead in Midway.