Sequoia or Yellowstone?

Neither place is for swimming, but Sequoia at least gives you a pleasant dip in late summer. Once the snowmelt drops, the granite pools of the Kaweah around Three Rivers and the small sandy shore of Hume Lake are warm enough to enjoy in July and August.

Yellowstone's water stays bitterly cold: the lake barely warms even in August, the thermal pools are scalding and forbidden, and the Firehole River near Madison offers only a quick plunge. In both, rivers can be deadly when they run high.

Food is practical in both, built around lodge dining rooms, store counters and camp cooking. Sequoia's interest lies down in the San Joaquin Valley, with orchard fruit stands, taquerias and Fresno's Armenian and Hmong cooking.

Yellowstone leans on Rocky Mountain flavours instead: bison burgers, elk sausage, trout and huckleberry pie in the gateway towns, with more ambitious kitchens in Jackson and Bozeman, a long way from the geysers.

Yellowstone has a clearer human story to tell. As the first national park, it keeps the great log lobby of the Old Faithful Inn, the Roosevelt Arch and the stone army buildings of Fort Yellowstone, and the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody is a serious museum of Plains Indian life and Western art.

Sequoia's heritage is smaller in scale: the Giant Forest Museum, the rock paintings and grinding holes at Hospital Rock, and the ranger tours of Crystal Cave. A visitor who wants buildings and collections will run out of things sooner here.

There is no night out in either place. Evenings in Sequoia end with a ranger talk or a campfire under dark skies, and in Yellowstone with a drink in a lodge lounge before an early night for dawn wildlife watching in Lamar Valley.

Both are among the great landscapes of North America, so the choice is about what kind of wonder you want. Sequoia is a forest and canyon place: the General Sherman and the Giant Forest groves, the view from Moro Rock, the sheer walls of Kings Canyon and long hikes over the High Sierra toward Mount Whitney.

Yellowstone is about volcanic ground and big animals. Geysers, Grand Prismatic Spring and the Mammoth terraces sit beside wolves, grizzlies and bison herds in open valleys, with the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and the Tetons just south.

Yellowstone gives more reasons to leave the park for a day. Jackson's town square and wildlife art museum, Buffalo Bill's Cody, gold-rush Virginia City and the high Beartooth Highway to Red Lodge each make a distinct outing, though every one is a long drive.

Sequoia's options are quieter: Visalia's tree-lined downtown, the Forestiere Underground Gardens in Fresno, Hanford's old Chinese quarter and Allensworth. The flat farmland between them offers little to look at outside blossom season.

Yellowstone is the easier sell to children. Predictable eruptions, belching mud pots, short flat boardwalks and animals seen from the car keep the day lively, and the wildlife centre in West Yellowstone shows bears and wolves up close.

Sequoia works best for families already at home outdoors. The Big Trees Trail and the Tunnel Log impress, but the switchback roads trouble carsick children, Moro Rock has big drops, and there is little to do beyond the forest.

Both demand a car and long, slow drives. Sequoia's challenge is the climb: the Generals Highway twists through dozens of hairpins, and Mineral King and Cedar Grove sit at the end of seasonal roads, though a summer shuttle around the Giant Forest and a bus from Visalia ease things slightly.

Yellowstone's challenge is distance and traffic on the Grand Loop, with bison jams and full car parks and no public transport at all. Most roads also close to cars for half the year.

Neither is a shopping destination, and both stop at gift shops and general stores. Yellowstone's gateway towns add a bit more character, with cowboy boots, hats and wildlife bronzes in Cody and Jackson, while Sequoia's most local purchase is fruit from a valley stand.

Sequoia is the cheaper trip. Its campgrounds are some of the least expensive places to sleep in California, and staying in Visalia brings rooms well below park prices, at the cost of daily mountain driving.

Yellowstone's summer is costly: lodge and motel rooms are expensive for their comfort, and Jackson is among the priciest small towns in the country. Camping, picnic lunches and a spring or autumn visit narrow the gap.

Neither place is worth the trip for performance alone, but Yellowstone's surroundings offer slightly more to attend. Cody holds a rodeo on most summer evenings, a real Western spectacle. Near Jackson, the Grand Teton Music Festival brings a summer season of classical concerts by professional musicians to Teton Village.

In Sequoia, live performance means going down to the valley: Visalia's restored Fox Theatre or Fresno's orchestra and historic theatres. The drive back up to the trees afterwards is long and dark.

Neither offers proper spas, so calm comes from the setting. In Sequoia that means a creekside cottage in Three Rivers or a cabin by the silent groves, with no traffic at night.

Yellowstone has one thing Sequoia lacks: open-air hot-spring pools near Gardiner and in Paradise Valley, good for a soak after a day on the road. Its stillness, though, depends on early mornings or the quieter weeks of September.