Arles or Toulouse?

Arles has real sea within reach and Toulouse does not. The Camargue shore around Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, about 40km away, and the open strands of Piémanson and Beauduc have long, wild sand and shallow water. You need a car, though, and there is little shade or service.

From Toulouse the nearest coast is around Gruissan and Narbonne, two hours each way. In practice, swimming there means the supervised lakes at Sesquières and La Ramée or a hotel pool.

Toulouse is the stronger place to eat. As the capital of south-western cooking it has cassoulet, foie gras and magret, the Victor Hugo covered market with its upstairs lunch counters, and cheap student eating as well. That gives you more choice through the week and through the year.

Arles has a distinct table of its own, with gardiane bull stew, Camargue rice and tellines, and its Saturday market on the Boulevard des Lices is a superb morning out. But the restaurant range is narrow and many places close in winter.

Both reward about two days, but Arles packs more into less space. The working Roman arena, the antique theatre, the cryptoporticus and the Alyscamps are all UNESCO-listed and a short walk apart, and Saint-Trophime's carving and the Van Gogh connection add to them.

Toulouse is more a medieval and Renaissance city. Its rose-brick streets lead to Saint-Sernin, the palm-tree vault of the Jacobins and the woad merchants' mansions, with the aerospace museums as an unusual extra. Both cities have fine Romanesque buildings, but only Arles has the Roman monuments.

Toulouse is far livelier after dark. Its large student population keeps Place Saint-Pierre and the river quays busy, there are wine bars in Carmes and the Daurade, and clubs carry on later, although things thin out in July and August.

In Arles an evening means dinner on a square and a drink on the Place du Forum, and then the town goes quiet. Only the Easter and September ferias keep its streets up late.

Arles has the more striking landscape on its doorstep. The Camargue begins at the edge of town, with flamingos, white horses, black bulls and migrating birds, and you can explore it on horseback, by bike along the dykes or on foot. The Alpilles add hill walking among olive groves and pines.

The countryside around Toulouse is gentle farmland, best seen from the shaded Canal du Midi towpaths. Its big asset, the Pyrenees, is one and a half to two hours away, which is good for hikers and skiers ready for the journey. The everyday outdoors near the city is tamer.

Both make excellent bases, but Arles has more within a short hop. Avignon and Nîmes are each well under an hour by train, and the Pont du Gard, Les Baux, Saint-Rémy and Aigues-Mortes are all close, with Marseille and Aix about an hour away.

Toulouse has two outstanding outings about an hour away by train, Carcassonne's walled Cité and Albi's cathedral, with Moissac's cloister and Montauban nearby. Beyond those the choices are further apart and depend more on a car.

Arles keeps children busy with ruins and animals rather than attractions built for them. They can climb the arena towers and explore the dark cryptoporticus, and outside town they can ride ponies at the Camargue ranches and watch flamingos, which suits older children. Cobbled streets, summer mosquitoes and the need for a car make it harder with small ones.

A full-size Ariane rocket and a Mir module to walk through give Toulouse a whole day at the Cité de l'espace alone. On top of that, children can step inside a Concorde at the aircraft museum, and there are playgrounds at the Jardin des Plantes, the natural history museum and a drive-through safari park. For families, and especially those with younger children, Toulouse is the easier choice.

Inside Arles you can walk everywhere. The arena, the theatre and the quays are about fifteen minutes apart, a free shuttle loops the centre, and the station is close by for trains to Avignon and Nîmes. Beyond the town it is another matter. Buses to the villages are infrequent, and the Camargue, its beaches and the hill villages really need a car or a bike, so most people staying a few days hire a car.

With two automated metro lines, trams, a bike scheme and a flat centre inside the ring of boulevards, Toulouse can be managed without a car for the whole stay. You only need one for the Pyrenees and the rural villages, which makes it the easier city of the two to get around.

Toulouse offers the fuller shopping trip. There are chains and a department store on Rue d'Alsace-Lorraine, independent boutiques and antiques around Saint-Étienne, and violet sweets, Armagnac and jars of cassoulet at the markets.

Arles is about souvenirs with character rather than range: Provençal printed cottons, santons, gardian shirts, Camargue salt, and photography books from a town known for publishing. For fashion, Arles shoppers go to Aix or Marseille.

The two cost about the same overall, but the money goes in different places. Arles is a reasonable base by Provençal standards and has a combined pass for its sights, but rooms are scarcer during the summer festival and the ferias, and you will almost certainly pay for a hire car.

Toulouse saves you money on getting about, with cheap public transport and student-priced bars and simple food. Hotel rates go up during the big trade fairs.

Toulouse has the year-round programme. The Théâtre du Capitole stages opera and ballet with its own company, the Orchestre National du Capitole plays in the round Halle aux Grains, and small theatres and jazz bars fill the rest of the calendar.

In Arles most live performance happens in summer, with concerts in the Roman theatre and arena, world music at Les Suds and the brass bands of the ferias. Outside the warm months there is little beyond a modest town theatre.

Neither is a spa destination, and in both the real pleasure is the pace: long lunches and shaded squares. Arles leans towards rural retreats, with converted farmhouses and pools in the Camargue and the Alpilles. Toulouse has hammam-style day spas and big open-air pools in town, and proper thermal baths in the Pyrenees, a trip best made with an overnight stay.