Arequipa or Cusco?

Neither city is a beach destination, and swimming plays almost no part in either trip. Arequipa does at least have a coast you can reach by road. Mollendo and Mejia, about two hours away, have wide sandy beaches, though the Humboldt Current keeps the water cold. From Cusco, the only way to reach the sea is to fly down to the Pacific.

Arequipa is the better place to eat, mainly because of its own regional cooking. A long lunch in a picanteria, with rocoto relleno, river-shrimp chowder and chicha de guinapo, is a reason to visit in itself. The Sunday adobo and the queso helado sold from street carts are local dishes you will not find done the same way in Cusco.

Cusco's cooking is plainer highland food: potatoes, trout, alpaca and cuy, with San Pedro market as the everyday starting point. Its advantage is at the top end, in the Novoandino tasting menus around San Blas and in the Sacred Valley. Near the main square, though, many menus are aimed at tour groups, a problem Arequipa has far less of.

Cusco has the deeper history. A visitor walks along Inca walls like Hatun Rumiyoc, sees the Santo Domingo monastery rising from the sun temple of Qorikancha, and climbs up to the zigzag ramparts of Sacsayhuamán. You see two civilisations at once, one built on top of the other, and the Cusco School paintings in the cathedral add a third layer.

Arequipa's appeal is architectural and more uniform. It is a whole UNESCO centre of pale sillar stone, carved in a mestizo baroque that mixes Andean motifs with Spanish ones. Santa Catalina Monastery and the Juanita mummy are first-rate, but together they fill a few days, not the longer stay Cusco can.

Neither city is built for big nights, and Cusco has slightly more going on. Its bars and clubs off the Plaza de Armas fill with backpackers and trekkers, with hostel pub crawls and a few quieter cocktail bars in San Blas.

Arequipa's scene on Calle San Francisco belongs more to local students, with salsa and reggaeton late on weekends and quiet weeknights. In both cities, pre-dawn tour departures cut evenings short, and in Cusco the altitude makes drinks hit harder.

Cusco has the wider mountain country on its doorstep. The terraced Sacred Valley lies just below the city. Day hikes reach Humantay lake and Rainbow Mountain, and longer treks follow the Inca Trail, the Salkantay route and the circuit around Ausangate, with rafting and downhill biking as well.

Arequipa is more focused but just as dramatic. You can climb El Misti, or Chachani, one of the more accessible 6,000m peaks. Colca Canyon has condors at Cruz del Condor and treks down to oases on the canyon floor. For gentler days, the green campina offers easy walks right at the edge of the city.

This is where the two differ most. From Cusco, a full list of Inca and colonial sites lies about an hour away: Pisac, Ollantaytambo, Chinchero, Moray with the Maras salt pans, and the quieter route south-east to Andahuaylillas and Tipón. Then there is Machu Picchu, a long day by road, train and bus.

Arequipa's easy outings are smaller country trips, such as the Sabandia mill, the Mansion del Fundador and the Sunday restaurants of Characato. Colca and the Toro Muerto petroglyphs are three hours or more each way, so they work better as overnight trips than day trips.

Arequipa is much easier with children. It sits around 1,000m lower than Cusco, so altitude is far less of a worry, and the flat centre with its calm plazas is easy to manage with a pushchair or small legs. It has no zoos or theme parks, but older children usually enjoy Santa Catalina and the frozen mummy.

Cusco is hard going with young children. Altitude sickness is a real risk at 3,400m, the cobbled lanes are steep and narrow, and the days are built around ruins and early starts. Families often base themselves lower down in the Sacred Valley, where the llamas and alpacas are the highlight.

Both centres are compact enough to walk, with cheap taxis for anything further. Arequipa is the more comfortable on foot, because its grid around the Plaza de Armas is almost level, though the pavements are narrow and the traffic is heavy.

In Cusco, the walks up to San Blas or Sacsayhuamán are steep climbs in thin air, and the uneven cobbles need care. Getting further out is also more complicated there, with minibuses to the Sacred Valley and a train from outside the city for Machu Picchu.

Both cities are about alpaca, and Cusco gives you more to browse. There are natural-dye weaving cooperatives in Chinchero, ceramics and silver workshops in San Blas, and large craft halls. The catch is that much of what is sold near the plaza is the same factory-made stock, and not every label claiming alpaca is honest.

Arequipa's range is narrower, but the quality is more reliable. Buying direct from the mill outlets and showrooms of Peru's alpaca industry is the safe way to get real baby alpaca or vicuna, and Fundo El Fierro adds local craft.

Arequipa is the cheaper stay overall. Colonial guesthouses, picanteria lunches and taxis cost little, and the main extra cost is a Colca tour or a guided climb.

Cusco is also cheap day to day, but its big outings are hard to avoid and they are expensive. The Machu Picchu train and entry, and treks like the Inca Trail, are priced for foreigners, and the boutique mansion hotels charge close to international rates.

Arequipa's stage life is the more formal kind. The Teatro Municipal and the university cultural centres put on theatre and the regional symphony orchestra, and on weekends the penas have Andean folk bands and dancers performing over dinner. Its big moment is the founding anniversary in mid-August, when parades, folk dance and concerts fill the streets.

Cusco has little formal theatre or classical music, but folkloric dance shows run most evenings in the centre, and panpipe and charango bands play in many restaurants. Its real strength is its festivals: Inti Raymi at Sacsayhuamán around the June solstice, and the masked dancers of Corpus Christi and the Qoyllur Rit'i pilgrimage in the mountains.

Arequipa is the easier place to slow down. Dry, sunny and unhurried, it is good for long lunches and quiet hours in a cloister courtyard. The old volcanic thermal pools at Yura are under an hour away, and the open-air springs near Chivay make a good end to a day at Colca.

Cusco is tiring at first, with thin air, cold nights and early tour starts. In town, the comforts are cheap massages around the main square and hotel spas, some of which pump oxygen into the rooms. For real rest, many visitors move down to a riverside lodge in the Sacred Valley.