Panama City Beach or Wilmington?

Panama City Beach is built on its beach. About 43km of fine white quartz sand lies right in front of the hotels, the clear green Gulf water is warmer, and you also get the sheltered lagoon at St. Andrews and boats out to undeveloped Shell Island.

Wilmington's beaches are good, and Wrightsville, Carolina and Kure each have a different character, from polished to casual to quiet. But they are 15km or more from the city, so every swim means a drive and, on summer weekends, a search for parking. Rip currents are a real hazard on both coasts.

Both cities eat mainly seafood, but Panama City Beach rarely goes beyond grouper, shrimp baskets and oysters at dockside shacks, with chains and themed restaurants filling the strip.

Wilmington has more depth: modern Southern cooking in old brick buildings downtown, shrimp and grits, eastern North Carolina's whole-hog barbecue and a craft brewery scene in the north end of downtown. Neither is worth the trip for food alone, but Wilmington gives you more good dinners.

Panama City Beach has very little to see. The strip is modern condo towers, the small Man in the Sea Museum covers diving history, and the older streets are across the bay in St. Andrews.

Wilmington has a real past to explore. One of the state's largest historic districts has antebellum and Victorian houses under live oaks, and house museums tell the story of the port's wealth and the enslaved people who built it. Add the Cotton Exchange and the Battleship North Carolina across the river. It is modest by big-city standards but fills two or three good days.

In Panama City Beach, going out means beach decks and tiki bars with frozen drinks at sunset. The town is quiet by mid-evening for most of the year and loud only in March, when spring break takes over Front Beach Road.

Wilmington has a proper downtown for a night out. The bars, rooftop terraces and pubs around Front Street fill at weekends, helped by the university crowd, and the beach towns add bars in summer. Neither city has a real club scene.

Both are flat, watery coasts where most outdoor life happens on the water. Panama City Beach has the tall white dunes and snorkelling lagoon of St. Andrews, a rare coastal dune lake at Camp Helen, and diving on offshore wrecks and artificial reefs.

Wilmington has a little more variety: kayaking to undeveloped Masonboro Island, surfing off Wrightsville, salt marsh and longleaf pine, and the Venus flytrap growing wild in Carolina Beach State Park. In both places summers are humid and there are no hills to climb.

From Panama City Beach, the trips are mostly about polished planned towns. Seaside, WaterColor and Rosemary Beach along Scenic Highway 30A have pastel cottages, town squares and gallery streets, and Destin's harbour is close by. The old oyster port of Apalachicola and Pensacola's historic district add some history if you are willing to drive further.

From Wilmington, the outings lean more towards history and boats. You can take the ferry from Southport to car-free Bald Head Island, see the Civil War earthworks at Fort Fisher and the colonial ruins of Brunswick Town, or drive north to New Bern's governor's palace. Myrtle Beach is there if you miss a resort strip. From either city, every one of these trips needs a car.

Panama City Beach is set up for families. You stay in a condo with a pool, the water is shallow and warm, the St. Andrews lagoon is safe for small children, and a water park, dolphin shows, go-karts and mini-golf line a single road. Avoid March and take the beach flags seriously.

Wilmington works well too. There are boardwalk rides at Carolina Beach, and the aquarium at Fort Fisher and the battleship's decks are good on rainy days. But the beaches and attractions are spread out, so more of the day goes on driving between them.

You need a car in both. Panama City Beach is a 43km ribbon along one beach road and a highway, with patchy pavements, a slow trolley-bus and no streets worth walking. The sand is the best footpath it has.

Wilmington at least has a compact, flat downtown and historic district linked by the riverwalk, so you can park once and spend a day on foot. The beaches, the aquarium and Southport still mean driving.

Neither is a shopping destination, but they shop in different ways. Panama City Beach means chain stores and a department store at Pier Park, plus huge beachwear warehouses with shark-mouth entrances. Wilmington's downtown has independent boutiques, bookshops, galleries and antique dealers along Front Street and in the Cotton Exchange, better for browsing than for buying lots.

Costs are much alike: normal American resort prices, a hire car you can't avoid in either place, and summer as the expensive season. The difference is how you save. In Panama City Beach a condo kitchen and a long winter stay bring costs down sharply, while in Wilmington the better value is off-season hotel rooms in town and casual barbecue and seafood.

Panama City Beach offers cover bands on restaurant decks and a few summer concerts at the shopping centre, with a modest historic theatre across the bay in Panama City.

Wilmington has a much fuller calendar. Thalian Hall, a restored 19th-century opera house, stages local theatre, music and touring shows, and the city also has a community symphony, small theatre companies, outdoor stages by Greenfield Lake and long-running jazz and blues festivals.

In Panama City Beach, the calm comes from the sand. From autumn to spring the beach empties and long walks at sunset take over, though summer and spring break bring the noise back. In Wilmington it comes from the town itself, with a slow pace and quiet riverfront evenings outside summer weekends. There is no spa or bathing tradition in either place, so wellness means resort spas, day spas and some yoga.