Antalya or Burgas?

Antalya gives you more beach, and for longer. Konyaaltı is a long stretch of coarse pebble under the mountains with clear water that deepens fast, and Lara has the sand. Within an hour there are the pine-fringed coves around Kemer and Phaselis and the resort shores of Belek.

Burgas has the softer beach on its doorstep. Central Beach below the Sea Garden has dark, fine sand and shallow water, though the nearby port sends many locals out to Sarafovo or Kraimorie. The coast offers variety too, from Sozopol's bays to the broad sands of Sunny Beach, but the swimming season is much shorter.

Antalya has the deeper local cooking, once you leave the hotel buffet: piyaz with a tahini dressing beside şiş köfte, slow-cooked tandır lamb, long breakfasts and markets piled with citrus and pomegranates. The best meals are in plain köfte houses and coastal fish restaurants rather than in Kaleiçi.

Burgas keeps things simpler, with fried sprats, grilled bluefish and gulf mussels at harbourside tables, plus shopska salad and morning banitsa. Its real advantage is the wine, from the Pomorie vineyards and Thracian reds. Otherwise the range is narrow.

Antalya has far more to see. You enter walled Kaleiçi through Hadrian's Gate, walk among restored Ottoman houses below the Yivli Minare, and the Antalya Museum holds marble statues from Perge that rank among the country's better collections.

Burgas is essentially a modern port with modest sights: the cathedral, a handful of small regional museums and the sculptures of the Sea Garden. The boat out to St Anastasia Island and the Roman and Ottoman baths of Aquae Calidae add some depth, but two days is enough.

Both cities come alive in summer and quieten in winter, but Antalya offers more to choose from. There are courtyard bars in Kaleiçi's lanes, terraces round the harbour, and beach clubs and open-air venues along Konyaaltı and Lara. The catch is the distance between areas, which means taxis.

Burgas itself is calmer and more local, with beach bars along the Sea Garden and late bars around Aleksandrovska and Bogoridi streets. Anyone after an all-night party takes the forty-minute trip to Sunny Beach.

Antalya's setting is far grander. You can take the cable car up Tahtalı Dağı, walk stretches of the Lycian Way past Olympos, raft in Köprülü Canyon, dive along the coast, and even ski at Saklıkent in winter. Even in town, the Düden falls pour off a cliff into the sea.

Burgas has no mountains to offer, but it has birds. Its lagoons and salt pans fill with storks, pelicans and flamingos on migration, the Poda reserve has hides, and the flat lakeshores suit easy cycling. Strandzha's oak and beech hills lie about an hour south.

Antalya's surroundings are exceptional for ancient sites: the stadium at Perge, the Roman theatre at Aspendos, Termessos high on its peak, and longer days out to Myra and the sunken city at Kekova. Most of them are much easier with a car or a tour.

Burgas has fewer outings, but they are easier to reach. Nessebar's medieval churches and Sozopol's wooden old quarter are each about forty minutes away by regional bus, and Pomorie and Varna fill further days. The major inland sites are too far for a day trip.

Antalya is set up for children on a much bigger scale. The resorts at Lara, Belek and Kemer have pools, slides and kids' clubs, Belek has a large theme and water park, and the city aquarium covers the hot middle of the day. July heat and Kaleiçi's steep lanes are the drawbacks.

Burgas works for small children mainly because of its gentle, shallow sea and the shaded playgrounds of the Sea Garden, and its flat centre is easy with a pushchair. Beyond that, little in the city is built for children, and the water parks are up the coast.

Burgas is the easier city to get around. Its small, flat centre takes you on foot from the station to the beach, the airport is close by, and regional buses run to Sozopol, Nessebar and Pomorie, though they get crowded in high summer.

Antalya's tram does link the airport, the old town and Konyaaltı, but the resort coast stretches for tens of kilometres. The ruins and mountain trails are poorly served by public transport, so a hire car or a tour becomes almost essential.

Neither city is a shopping destination, but Antalya gives you more to browse. Kaleiçi sells carpets, ceramics, leather and Turkish delight, with plenty of haggling, and the weekly neighbourhood markets are good for spices and dried fruit.

Burgas offers high-street chains along its pedestrian streets and a few malls. The souvenirs worth carrying home are rose oil, honey, local wine and Black Sea salt from Pomorie.

Burgas is the cheaper of the two. Meals of grilled fish with local wine, coastal buses and museum entry all cost well below Western levels, and rooms in the city are often cheaper than in the resorts it serves. The exception is July and August, when it pays to book ahead.

Antalya can be good value too, especially at local köfte houses or on an all-inclusive family package. However, Kaleiçi restaurants, beach clubs, boat trips and summer rooms by the sea are all priced for foreigners.

Both cities have a resident opera and ballet company, so they are broadly level, and the difference is in the setting. Antalya's standout is the summer opera and ballet festival on the Roman stage at Aspendos, performed under the stars.

Burgas adds a philharmonic and open-air summer festivals in the Sea Garden. In the Strandzha villages, nestinari fire-dancing and folk music survive as living customs rather than staged shows.

Antalya is the better place to be pampered. The old hammams of Kaleiçi offer the full scrub and foam on warm marble, and the large resorts in Belek and Lara have extensive spas with their own saunas.

Burgas offers something earthier: black, salty mud from the Atanasovsko and Pomorie lakes, used in sanatoria or simply smeared on at the shore, and mineral springs used since Roman times. For polished spa hotels you need to head to Pomorie.