Palm Springs or Steamboat Springs?

Neither town is a beach destination, and both leave you a long drive from any coast. What differs is how you get wet. In Palm Springs it is the pool, the centre of almost every hotel and rental house through a long, hot season.

In Steamboat the water is cold and the season short: a few people swim in the mountain reservoirs in July and August, and most simply float down the Yampa on a tube.

Palm Springs eats better, though not by a great margin. Shaded brunch patios, poolside cocktails and steady American restaurants on Palm Canyon Drive are backed by the valley's date shakes and honest Mexican taquerias further east.

Steamboat's tables are hearty western resort fare, steakhouses with Colorado lamb and beef, pizza and local breweries, welcome after a day on the slopes but narrow in range. Neither is a place to plan a trip around eating.

Here Palm Springs is far ahead. Its mid-century modern buildings, from Albert Frey's angular houses to Neutra's Kaufmann House and the folded roofs of the Alexander tract homes, fill a day of driving or cycling, and the art museum and Agua Caliente Cultural Museum add depth.

Steamboat's heritage is ranching and skiing, readable in the old storefronts of Lincoln Avenue, the Tread of Pioneers Museum and Howelsen Hill's long Olympic line. It is pleasant for an hour, not a reason to visit.

Palm Springs has the livelier evenings, built around the long-established LGBTQ bars and drag nights of Arenas Road, retro cocktail lounges and spring pool parties at the hotels.

Steamboat's going out is après-ski: drinks at the gondola base as the lifts close, then saloons and brewpubs on Lincoln Avenue, with things quiet before midnight outside peak weeks. Neither town has real clubs.

Both are outdoor towns, but Steamboat edges ahead because the outdoors works in every season. Winter brings its famous light powder, aspen glades and backcountry at Rabbit Ears Pass; summer turns the same hills into bike and hiking trails, with Fish Creek Falls, the alpine lakes of the Mount Zirkel Wilderness, fly fishing on the Yampa, and elk and moose.

Palm Springs has drama of its own: the tramway up to pine forest on San Jacinto, palm oases in the Indian Canyons and Joshua Tree an hour away. Its limit is summer heat, which confines hiking to dawn or the upper mountain.

Palm Springs has far more within reach by car, and its outings are small and offbeat: the pine village of Idyllwild, the lived-in film set of Pioneertown, the abandoned shoreline towns and Salvation Mountain by the Salton Sea, and the Temecula wineries.

Steamboat is remote. The nearby ranching towns merit a coffee stop at most, Vail and Denver are long mountain drives away, and an excursion here almost always means heading into the hills instead.

Steamboat is much the better family base. It has courted families for decades, with a strong ski school, quiet first turns at Howelsen Hill, warm pools, slides and a climbing wall at Old Town Hot Springs, and summer tubing, waterfall walks and the rodeo. It suits children who like being outside, though there are no zoos or theme parks.

Palm Springs leans towards adults, with many adults-only boutique hotels and a cocktail-and-pool-party social life. The Living Desert, the tramway and the Air Museum make good outings, and families settle best in the big resorts down the valley.

Steamboat is the easier of the two without a car, though only up to a point. A town bus links the old downtown with the ski base through the day, and many slopeside lodgings let you walk to the gondola. Strawberry Park, the falls and the passes still need a car, with winter tyres.

In Palm Springs the downtown strip is flat and walkable and the airport is right on the edge of town, but slow, sparse buses mean the tramway, the canyons and Joshua Tree all depend on driving.

Palm Springs is a genuine shopping stop, specialising in mid-century furniture, lighting and vintage clothing in the Uptown Design District, with El Paseo's luxury boutiques and the large Cabazon outlets nearby.

Steamboat's offer is a walk down Lincoln Avenue for boots, hats and saddle-blanket goods, best of all at the century-old outfitter F.M. Light & Sons, plus galleries and ski shops.

Neither is cheap, but Palm Springs is the easier on the wallet. Its high season from winter into spring is pricey, yet summer rooms drop sharply and simple motels keep costs down year round.

Steamboat's ski season stacks lodging, lift access, equipment hire and resort dining together, peaking at Christmas and the spring school breaks. Summer and the shoulder months are gentler, though some places close.

Palm Springs has the bigger stage. Coachella and Stagecoach fill the polo grounds at Indio each April, the McCallum Theatre and casino venues book touring acts, and drag cabaret and piano bars give the town its own flavour.

Steamboat's music belongs to summer, when the long-running Strings Music Festival, free outdoor concerts and the Perry-Mansfield school's theatre and dance fill the warm months. The seasons are opposite: Palm Springs falls silent in summer, just when Steamboat comes alive.

Both towns grew up around hot water, but Palm Springs is the more complete place to switch off. The Agua Caliente bathhouse downtown, the spring-fed spa motels of Desert Hot Springs and a whole rhythm of late breakfasts and poolside afternoons make rest the purpose of the stay.

In Steamboat a soak is more often the reward after a day outdoors, at the town's Old Town Hot Springs or in the rock pools of Strawberry Park up a wooded creek, especially memorable on a snowy evening.