Alexandria or Paphos?

Alexandria's beaches are a local summer ritual. The public city strands are narrow and crowded. The better sand at Montaza and Mamoura sits behind gates in paid clubs, and swimming dress is conservative outside the private clubs and hotel beaches. It works for a few dips between sights, not for a beach vacation.

In Paphos the sea is the main attraction. The town beaches along the Kato Paphos promenade are small and rocky, but the shallow sandy crescent of Coral Bay is a short ride north and Lara Bay on the Akamas coast is wild and undeveloped. The water is clearer, and the beach days are far more relaxed.

Alexandria eats better, and fish is the reason. In Anfushi and around the Eastern Harbour you pick your catch, have it weighed and get it back grilled or baked in clay. Between meals there are liver sandwiches, fiteer pastries and the old Greek patisseries downtown. Alcohol is hard to find outside hotels, though.

Paphos rewards you if you leave the harbour, where much of the cooking is aimed at package tourists. In Ktima and the hill villages, a long meze with halloumi, kleftiko and local Laona wine is generous and convivial. It is a smaller food scene, but an easier one if you want a glass of wine with dinner.

The two are well matched for history, but you see it in different ways. In Alexandria you hunt for fragments spread across a large city: the Kom el Shoqafa catacombs, Kom el-Dikka's theatre, the Qaitbay Citadel and the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. Between them runs a faded belle époque townscape with Cavafy's house.

Paphos packs its past into a compact UNESCO-listed cluster by the harbour. The House of Dionysus mosaics and the rock-cut Tombs of the Kings are the highlights, and both are within walking distance of each other. Outside those sites the modern resort town has little to look at, while Alexandria's streets are part of the sightseeing.

Paphos has more of a night out, at least in season. Bar Street in Kato Paphos fills with pubs, karaoke and a few late clubs in summer, though most of it goes quiet from November to March.

Alexandria's evenings are about the seafront, not drinking. Coffee houses and shisha terraces on the Corniche stay busy past midnight, with only a few Greek-era bars and hotel lounges for a drink.

This is where the two differ most. Alexandria offers the sea and its sunsets, plus dives over the submerged remains of the Pharos. Inland there is only flat farmland, Lake Mariout and desert.

Paphos has varied country close at hand. There is the protected Akamas peninsula, with sea caves and turtle beaches, the narrow limestone walls of Avakas Gorge, mouflon in the Paphos Forest and pine hiking in the Troodos. Spring and autumn suit walking best.

From Alexandria the outings are fewer but distinctive. There are Rosetta's Ottoman houses, the war cemeteries at El Alamein and the ancient monasteries of Wadi Natrun. Cairo and the pyramids are possible in a long day, but they really deserve a stay of their own.

With a car, Paphos opens up more. Kourion's cliff-top ruins, the sanctuary at Kouklia and Limassol are all within about an hour. Beyond them lie the wine villages around Omodos, the painted Troodos churches and the divided capital of Nicosia.

Children are welcomed everywhere in Alexandria, with ice cream, horse carriages and Montaza's gardens. But there is little else made for them, and the crowded beaches and fast Corniche traffic are tiring with small ones. Older children who like catacombs and forts get the most from it.

Paphos is set up for families. It has Coral Bay's shallow water, resort pools with kids' clubs, a water park, a zoo and boat trips. Tavernas happily keep children up late, and the main drawbacks are the midsummer heat and needing a car.

Neither city is especially easy to get around, but the reasons differ. Alexandria stretches along some 20km of coast, so you rely on cheap taxis, ride-hailing and the slow old tram, often in traffic. Driving yourself is best avoided.

In Paphos you can walk the flat Kato Paphos promenade, but the gorges, villages and Coral Bay are scattered. Most visitors hire a car and drive on the left on good roads.

Neither is a shopping destination, but Alexandria has a little more character. You can browse the antique and furniture dealers of the Attarin quarter for relics of the cosmopolitan era, and the souks around Manshiyya sell fabric and spices.

In Paphos, the Ktima covered market and the seafront gift shops are thin. The better buys are lace, pottery, honey and wine bought in the villages where they are made.

Alexandria is far cheaper. Taxis, street food, harbour fish dinners and seafront hotels all cost little, and foreigners' site fees are the main expense. Rooms get dearer only for a few busy summer weeks.

Paphos costs what a eurozone Mediterranean resort costs, and car hire adds to the bill. Meze dinners and the archaeological sites are fair value, but July and August hotels are expensive. Winter and the shoulder months are noticeably cheaper.

Alexandria offers a little more to attend through the year. The Sayed Darwish Theatre stages opera, ballet and Arabic music, and the Bibliotheca Alexandrina runs concerts and film, though the programme is irregular and mostly in Arabic.

In Paphos, the open-air opera in front of the harbour castle each early autumn is a memorable occasion. For the rest of the year it is mostly folk nights in tavernas.

Paphos is the more restful choice. Its large seafront resorts have spas with indoor pools, and the quiet villages inland and the emptier coast outside high summer encourage a slower pace.

In Alexandria, unwinding means a hotel spa or long mornings in old cafés and sea air on the Corniche. Traffic noise and the summer crowds keep it from being a place to switch off.