San Francisco or Portland?

Neither city is for a beach vacation, and the difference is in how they use the water. Portland's swimming happens on its rivers in summer, at the small sandy beaches in Sellwood and downtown and on Sauvie Island, and the river is warm enough for a dip from July to early September.

San Francisco faces the open Pacific, with Ocean Beach and Baker Beach right in the city and the Golden Gate Bridge behind them. The water is too cold and too rough for anything but a walk, a bonfire or a sunset. Portland's ocean shore, at Cannon Beach, is a day trip away and just as cold.

San Francisco is the better place to eat. It has dishes that are clearly its own, such as the Mission burrito, sourdough and cioppino, deep Cantonese and dim sum cooking in Chinatown and the Richmond, North Beach's Italian bakeries, and a fine-dining tier that Portland does not try to match.

Portland's strengths are casual. Its food cart pods offer cooking from around the world at shared tables, and it outdoes San Francisco on beer, with a craft brewery scene that is among the densest anywhere. Both cities share Dungeness crab, serious coffee and good wine from nearby valleys.

San Francisco offers much more to see. The Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, the cable cars and the painted Victorians of Alamo Square are known worldwide, and SFMOMA, the de Young and the Legion of Honor make museum days worth planning. Chinatown, the Mission's murals and the Castro add history in the streets.

Portland is more modest and is best known for its gardens. The Japanese Garden and the walled Lan Su Chinese Garden are the highlights, along with the Portland Art Museum's Native American collections and the view from Pittock Mansion. Two days covers it, against three or four for San Francisco.

San Francisco has slightly more range at night. SoMa's warehouse clubs give it a dance scene that Portland mostly lacks, and the Castro's bars and North Beach's old saloons add variety beyond the cocktail bars of the Mission.

Portland's nights are about bars, and plenty of them: taprooms, dives with pinball machines and wine bars along strips such as Alberta, Division and Hawthorne. It is relaxed and local, with bars open a little later, and it suits a long evening of talk better than dancing.

Both cities have outstanding surroundings, but of different kinds. Portland's are mountain and forest: over 110km of trails in Forest Park, the waterfalls and cliffs of the Columbia River Gorge, and Mount Hood for skiing and alpine hiking, with volcanic peaks on the horizon.

San Francisco's are coastal. The Lands End cliffs, the Presidio and Golden Gate Park are inside the city, and across the bridge the Marin Headlands, the Muir Woods redwoods and Point Reyes offer sea views, elk and elephant seals. Sailing and whale watching replace Portland's rivers and slopes.

Wine country is the best day out from both cities, and Portland's is the closer of the two. The Willamette Valley's pinot noir towns, McMinnville, Dundee and Newberg, are under an hour away. After that come Astoria's Victorian river port with its maritime museum and a coast day at Cannon Beach, but the list soon runs short and almost every outing needs a car.

From San Francisco, Napa and Sonoma lie about an hour north, and the list goes on much further. Ferries cross the bay to Sausalito and Tiburon, Berkeley is a short train ride away, and the coast road leads to the Santa Cruz boardwalk, the Monterey aquarium and the Carmel mission. That is enough to fill a week of outings without doing the same kind of trip twice.

Science museums are the main draw for families in either city. Portland's is the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, where children can climb through a submarine. Around it are the zoo and playground in Washington Park, the old-fashioned Oaks Amusement Park in Sellwood and summer fountains on the waterfront. The city is flat and easy with small legs, but the wet winters push everything indoors.

San Francisco offers families more to fill the days. The Exploratorium and the California Academy of Sciences, with its aquarium, planetarium and rainforest, can each fill a whole day, the sea lions on the Fisherman's Wharf docks cost nothing to watch, and a cable car ride is a treat in itself. The steep hills are the drawback with a pushchair, and both cities have downtown streets where poverty is visible.

San Francisco is easier without a car. It is compact, BART and Muni cover most of the city on one card, and ferries and cable cars help too, though the hills turn short walks into climbs.

Portland is flat and good for cycling, has short downtown blocks and the MAX from the airport. But many of its best neighbourhoods are spread over the east side and reached by bus, and the Gorge, the mountain and the coast more or less require hiring a car, which you need much less often from San Francisco.

Portland's shopping is mostly independent and spread across its neighbourhoods. Powell's City of Books fills a whole block in the Pearl District and is worth a visit for its own sake. Mississippi Avenue and Alberta Street have vintage clothing, record shops and makers' studios, and the Saturday Market under the Burnside Bridge sells local crafts. Outdoor gear is a strength, because several big sportswear names come from the region, and Oregon charges no sales tax on anything you buy.

San Francisco comes out a little ahead because it also has a central shopping district. Union Square is ringed by the department stores and luxury flagships that Portland largely lacks. Beyond it, the neighbourhoods have plenty of their own character, with design boutiques in Hayes Valley, upmarket clothing on Fillmore Street and vintage in Haight-Ashbury.

Portland is clearly cheaper. Hotels and sit-down meals cost what they do in most large American cities, but food carts, low transit fares and free parks keep a stay manageable, and car hire is the main cost to plan for.

San Francisco is one of the most expensive cities in the country to visit, with costly hotels everywhere in the centre and tax, service charges and tips on top of high menu prices. Mission taquerias, Chinatown dim sum and the free coastal trails help, but the bill still ends up much higher.

San Francisco is the place for an evening out at a big venue. The War Memorial Opera House is home to its opera and the country's oldest professional ballet company, the symphony plays at Davies Symphony Hall, and SFJAZZ and the Fillmore give jazz and rock established homes.

Portland covers the classics on a smaller scale, with the Oregon Symphony in a restored 1920s movie palace. Its real draw is indie rock and folk in small east-side rooms and the sprung floor of the Crystal Ballroom, which suits someone who would rather catch a band than buy opera tickets.

Neither city is a wellness destination, and both have their hot springs about two hours away. San Francisco's are at Calistoga, known for its mud baths and easily combined with a Napa trip, while Portland's lie in the Cascade forests.

In town, Portland is the calmer of the two, with soaking houses, forest trails and long café mornings. San Francisco's centre runs at a working pace, and the quiet is in Japantown's bathhouse and the Japanese Tea Garden.