Andorra la Vella or Zermatt?

Neither place has anywhere to swim in the open. Andorra la Vella's glacial lakes and Zermatt's Matterhorn-reflecting tarns are both too cold for more than a toe. The difference lies in the warm water: Andorra has the thermal lagoons of Caldea next door, while in Zermatt a swim means a hotel pool.

The food is equally good in both places, but it comes from two different mountain traditions. Andorra la Vella cooks Catalan: escudella, trinxat and lamb grilled over wood fires in old stone bordas in the side valleys, while the restaurants along the town's avenues are uneven.

Zermatt serves Valais cheese and air-dried beef, with Petite Arvine or Cornalin in the glass. Its best meals are long lunches at mountain chalets above Findeln or Furi, and a few ambitious fine-dining kitchens back them up. Cheap eating is easier to find in Andorra.

Andorra la Vella has a little more history to go and see. The Barri Antic and the fortified Casa de la Vall, seat of the old parliament, fill a walk. Romanesque churches such as Santa Coloma, with its round bell tower, are scattered through the nearby valleys.

Zermatt's heritage is narrower and all about mountaineering: the underground Matterhorn Museum on the 1865 first ascent, the climbers' cemetery and the larch-wood granaries of the Hinterdorf. That is a morning's worth, and the old Gornergrat railway is as much a ride as a sight.

Zermatt has the livelier evenings, because the skiing ends in the village itself. The runs come down to its edge, so the après-ski starts right where people unclip their skis. On busy winter weekends a handful of bars and small clubs along the main street keep going well after midnight. The mood is cheerful and expensive rather than sophisticated.

Andorra la Vella is a valley capital some distance from the pistes, so its après-ski crowd stays up in the resort villages near the French border. The town keeps its pubs and wine bars, which fill up a little on winter weekends. The seasons also work differently. In summer Zermatt's climbers and hikers are in bed soon after dinner, and between seasons much of the village closes. Andorra's town bars carry on at the same quiet pace all year.

Andorra la Vella makes a fine mountain base. The town lies deep in a valley ringed by peaks close to 3,000m. The ski areas are a short ride away, and the UNESCO-listed Madriu-Perafita-Claror valley begins at the edge of town. From late spring the trails climb to glacial lakes and mountain refuges, and road cyclists come for the long Pyrenean passes.

Zermatt goes further and higher. The Matterhorn stands directly over the village, surrounded by dozens of four-thousand-metre peaks and the Gorner Glacier, and the lifts reach above 3,800m. You can ski across the border into Italy, and the glacier keeps some pistes open through the summer.

Andorra la Vella has the better choice of outings. La Seu d'Urgell's cathedral and market are about half an hour away, the Cerdanya and Llívia about an hour, and Foix's castle in France a longer drive.

From Zermatt, every trip starts with the train down the valley, and the towns take longer to reach. Sion, with its two castle hills among the vineyards, is the one really worth the journey, and Brig is closer. Most visitors would rather spend a spare day up a mountain.

Both suit families who ski or hike, and neither has a zoo or theme park. Andorra la Vella offers more to do: toboggan runs, rope courses, a wildlife park and Caldea's family pools for a wet day. Its centre, though, is a busy shopping road full of traffic.

Zermatt is the reverse. Its car-free streets make walking with small children easy, but rainy days are hard to fill, and the highest viewpoints can be too cold and thin-aired for small children.

Zermatt is far easier once you arrive. You come by train, walk everywhere, and reach the cog railway, the Sunnegga funicular and the gondolas from the village centre, with smooth onward links into the Swiss rail network.

Andorra la Vella has no train at all. Getting there means a long drive from airports in Spain or France, and the main valley road clogs at weekends. Buses link the parishes, but trailheads are often easier with a car.

Andorra la Vella is a shopping destination in its own right. The low-tax avenues run unbroken into Escaldes-Engordany, lined with department stores and shops selling ski gear, electronics, perfume and spirits at prices that draw people over the border.

Zermatt's single main street sells luxury Swiss watches, very good mountaineering kit and cowbell souvenirs. Neither town has much character or local craft, but Andorra has far more to buy.

This is where the two differ most. Andorra la Vella costs about what the rest of Western Europe does: rooms are often good value outside the peak ski weeks, set lunches are fair and drinks are cheap thanks to low taxes. Only ski passes and the spa match resort prices.

Zermatt is among the most expensive places in the Alps, from plain hotel rooms to terrace drinks and the lifts everyone uses. Self-catering or sleeping down the valley in Täsch eases the cost, but it never becomes cheap.

Neither place has much live performance, and both depend on festivals. Andorra la Vella's are mostly in summer: jazz in Escaldes-Engordany and classical music in Ordino, plus a small national orchestra. Zermatt has acoustic sets at Zermatt Unplugged in spring and chamber music in the village church in late summer, and no concert hall to fall back on.

Both are good for unwinding after a day outdoors, in different ways. Andorra la Vella has real hot springs, feeding the lagoons, saunas and adults-only area of Caldea, but its traffic-filled avenues do not feel restful.

Zermatt has no thermal water. Instead it has many excellent hotel spas with mountain views, some open to non-residents, and the car-free, quiet village is calmer to be in.