Panama City or San Jose, Costa Rica?

Neither is a beach city, but Panama City at least sits on the sea. You can't swim in its own bay, but Isla Taboga has a calm beach a short ferry ride out. Coronado's Pacific sand and the clearer Caribbean water around Portobelo and Isla Grande are an hour or two away.

San Jose is high in the Central Valley, with no coast nearby. Jaco and Puntarenas are around two hours by road and often longer in traffic, so in town a swim means a hotel pool unless you move on to the coast for a night.

Panama City eats better, mostly thanks to the sea. Corvina and octopus ceviche at the Mercado de Mariscos, whole fried fish with patacones and the chefs' cooking in Casco Viejo give it more range, and Obarrio and El Cangrejo add international choice.

San Jose's strength is plain home cooking: gallo pinto, the casado plate and lunch at a soda or a Mercado Central counter, with Barrio Escalante for something more modern. Both are fine coffee cities. Panama has its prized Geisha beans, and San Jose has farms on the slopes around the valley.

Panama City has far more to see. Casco Viejo's balconied streets and golden altar, the ruins of Panamá Viejo and the ships rising at the Miraflores Locks fill two or three days, and the Gehry-designed Biomuseo on the Amador Causeway adds another.

San Jose lost most of its old buildings to earthquakes and growth, so its sights are a short list. There is the gilded Teatro Nacional, the Pre-Columbian Gold Museum, the Jade Museum and the National Museum in the bullet-marked Bellavista fortress. A day or two covers them.

Panama City goes out harder and later. The evening starts in rooftop bars and cocktail bars in Casco Viejo's colonial houses and moves on to clubs on Calle Uruguay and around Obarrio and Marbella. The crowd is locals, expats and business visitors, and people dress up a little.

San Jose's nights are more local and more student: craft beer in Barrio Escalante, cheap bars in San Pedro and salsa in the El Pueblo complex, where Ticos take their dancing seriously. In both cities you take a taxi between districts after dark.

Both make fine bases for nature, but the nature is different. Panama City's is lowland rainforest, and it starts inside the city: sloths and toucans on the trails of Parque Natural Metropolitano, the famous birding of Pipeline Road about forty minutes out, and monkeys along the banks of Gatún Lake as ships pass.\n\nSan Jose's is volcanic and mountainous, and most of it is further away. Braulio Carrillo's cloud forest is within an hour, but the crater rims of Poas and Irazu are a longer drive up the volcano roads. Rafting the Pacuare and Reventazon near Turrialba takes a full day. Choose Panama for wildlife close at hand and San Jose for craters, altitude and white water.

The day trips from each city are about as good, but quite different. From Panama City they lean to the coast and to history: the Spanish forts of Portobelo and San Lorenzo, the island village on Taboga, part of a Canal crossing by boat, or a dugout canoe to Emberá communities.

San Jose's are inland and gentler, a circuit of coffee towns. There is Cartago's basilica and church ruins, the old colonial church in the Orosi valley, Sarchi's painted oxcarts and farm tours on the slopes of Barva and Poas.

Neither city is easy with children, and they come out about even. In Panama City, children like the ships at Miraflores, the Biomuseo, bikes on the Amador Causeway and boat trips to see monkeys, but the heat and afternoon downpours are hard work.

San Jose has the Museo de los Ninos and La Sabana park in town, but the best family outings are just outside: volcano craters you can drive to, butterfly farms and waterfall gardens, all in a milder climate. In both cities, expect broken pavements and plenty of taxis.

Panama City is somewhat easier, mainly because it has a metro, clean and useful along the city's main axis. The Cinta Costera path also links Casco Viejo with the banking district on foot or by bike. Taxis and ride-hailing still do most of the work.

San Jose has no metro, and its buses, run by private companies from scattered terminals, are hard for a visitor to work out. The pedestrian stretch of Avenida Central helps downtown, but valley traffic makes every trip out of the city slower than the map suggests.

Panama City is better for shopping, mainly because of its huge malls near Albrook, Punta Pacífica and San Francisco, which draw shoppers from across Central America. The craft to take home is the Guna mola, along with Emberá baskets and tagua-nut carvings.

San Jose's shopping is more practical. You browse the Mercado Central for coffee, spices and leather, and the craft market for Boruca masks and oxcart miniatures. Its malls are out in Escazu, and neither city has a shopping street made for strolling.

Costs are close, and they follow the same pattern: local food, buses and taxis are cheap, and the money goes on rooms and tours. In Panama City the expensive part is staying and drinking in Casco Viejo or the banking district. In San Jose it is sit-down dining in Escalante or Escazu, imported drinks, and park fees that charge foreigners more, though hotels cost noticeably less than on the Costa Rican coast.

Both cities have an ornate Teatro Nacional at the centre of their cultural life, and neither is worth travelling to for performances. In Panama City the season there is limited, and the big event is the Panama Jazz Festival each January, with free outdoor concerts.

San Jose has a more regular programme. The National Symphony Orchestra plays through much of the year, the Teatro Melico Salazar adds dance and folk shows, and small theatres put on Spanish-language drama. If you want a planned evening at a performance, San Jose is the safer bet.

San Jose's mild, spring-like valley air gives it the edge for slowing down, though neither capital has a bathing tradition beyond hotel spas. Panama City is loud, hot and humid. Rest there means a pool deck in Punta Pacífica, Casco Viejo's empty streets early in the morning, or a few days away in the cooler highland valleys.\n\nFrom San Jose, calm places are closer. Lodges in the hills above Escazu and among the coffee farms on the volcano slopes have cool, quiet nights, and the Orosi valley has simple thermal pools within a couple of hours. The country's famous hot springs, around Arenal, are too far for a day trip.