Seattle or Tofino?

Neither place has warm sea swimming, and the beaches serve different purposes. In Seattle, Alki and Golden Gardens are for sunsets over the Olympics and bonfires. The actual swimming is in Lake Washington, whose lifeguarded beaches warm up enough in July and August for a proper dip.

Tofino's shore is the bigger draw: the 16km of Long Beach, the tide flats at Chesterman and the Pacific surf at Cox Bay. Getting in the water there means a thick wetsuit and a surfboard, and the exposed beaches have rip currents.

Both eat from the same cold waters, but Seattle offers far more. Pike Place Market, raw bars, smokehouses, geoduck and Dungeness crab sit alongside serious coffee roasters, Washington wines and strong Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese and Korean cooking in the International District.

Tofino has the same kind of seafood on a much smaller scale. You eat spot prawns and Clayoquot oysters, fish tacos from the food trucks, and a few ambitious tasting menus. With only a few dozen places, and shorter hours in winter, you will run out of new tables within a few days.

Seattle has a few solid days of sightseeing, all of it modern: the Space Needle and Chihuly glass at Seattle Center, the Museum of Pop Culture, the aircraft halls of the Museum of Flight and the rebuilt brick blocks of Pioneer Square.

Tofino has no museums or landmarks, and its culture takes an afternoon. What it does have is Nuu-chah-nulth carving and prints in its galleries, sometimes with work in progress, and the Kwisitis Visitor Centre. For Northwest Coast Indigenous art, Seattle's Burke Museum shows the collections, while Tofino shows the tradition still being practised.

Seattle has a real night out. The cocktail bars, dive bars and dance floors along Pike and Pine on Capitol Hill are busy at weekends, Ballard has its taprooms and Belltown its clubs, although things wind down at 2am.

Tofino has a pub or two, a brewery taproom and some restaurant bars full of surfers in summer. Most nights end with a fire on the beach and an early start for the tide.

Both are superb for the outdoors, but in different ways. Seattle is a base for big landscapes further out: Cascade trails under an hour east, winter skiing at Snoqualmie Pass, the glaciers of Mount Rainier about two hours away and the Olympic Peninsula across the Sound. Most of these need a car.

In Tofino the wilderness starts at the edge of town. You can walk among old-growth cedars on the Rainforest Trail and Meares Island, watch grey whales and bears from a boat, kayak around the islands of Clayoquot Sound, surf all year and watch the winter storms from the headlands.

The ferry gives Seattle its best days out: half an hour to Bainbridge Island's harbour town and galleries, or further to the Victorian seaport of Port Townsend. Woodinville's tasting rooms and Tacoma's Museum of Glass are both close enough for a relaxed day.

From Tofino there is little to visit beyond Ucluelet's lighthouse loop, a half day down the peninsula. Anything else means a long mountain road, so days out from Tofino are boat trips into the sound rather than visits to other towns.

Seattle is easier with children because it has places built for them. Woodland Park Zoo, the aquarium, the Pacific Science Center and the Museum of Flight cover the wet days, and the monorail and ferries count as outings in their own right. The steep streets up from the waterfront are the main nuisance.

Tofino suits outdoor families: tide pools, driftwood forts, beginner surf lessons in small wetsuits and campgrounds by the sand. There is no zoo or science museum to fall back on, so a run of rainy days is hard work, and the winding road in can be hard on young passengers.

Seattle can be managed without a car. Link light rail runs from the airport through downtown, and one card covers buses, the monorail and the water taxis. The centre is walkable if hilly, but buses to Ballard or Alki are slow, and the national parks need a car.

Tofino's village is only a few blocks, and the paved path towards the national park is a pleasure by bike. Public transport barely exists, though, so most visitors drive in over the mountains and keep the car for the beaches strung along the highway. The best outings go by water taxi or floatplane.

For browsing, Seattle goes much further. Downtown has department stores and big outdoor-gear shops, Capitol Hill has vintage clothes and records, and there are Fremont's Sunday market and Ballard's design shops. For luxury labels, the malls are across the lake in Bellevue.

In Tofino, shopping is a short walk round town. The galleries are worth the time for Nuu-chah-nulth carving, silver jewellery and West Coast photography, and the rest is mostly surf and outdoor gear and souvenirs.

Both are expensive, and Tofino is the harder of the two on a budget. In Seattle you can save by staying near a light rail stop outside the centre, using public transport and eating at food halls, teriyaki shops and Pike Place counters.

Tofino has few rooms, and everything there costs more because of its remoteness, from meals to groceries trucked over the mountains to boat tours. The savings come from free beaches and trails, campgrounds, and lower room rates in the stormy months.

Pacific Northwest Ballet and Seattle Opera share McCaw Hall at Seattle Center, the symphony plays a full season at Benaroya Hall, and touring musicals fill the 5th Avenue and the Paramount. This is also the city of Hendrix and grunge, and bands play in Belltown, Capitol Hill and Ballard most nights.

Tofino has nothing like this, with no theatre or concert venue at all. Live performance there means a local band at the pub now and then, or a small summer festival.

Tofino is the better place to rest. The tides set the pace, cabins come with private hot tubs, and resort spas offer seaweed and cedar treatments, with yoga easy to find. A boat or floatplane trip to the geothermal pools at Hot Springs Cove makes a full day.

Seattle has hotel spas and Korean-style bathhouses in the suburbs, and quiet hours in the Japanese Garden or a neighbourhood coffee house. Its natural hot springs are a long drive into the mountains.