Assisi or Cortina d'Ampezzo?

Neither town is a swimming destination, and both are two hours or more from the sea. The difference is the water nearby. From Assisi, the small lidos at Passignano and Castiglione del Lago on Lake Trasimeno give warm, shallow swimming in summer, while Cortina's alpine lakes such as Ghedina and Pianozes stay cold with snowmelt and are better for a walk than a swim. In both places, a hotel pool is the realistic option.

Both eat about equally well, but the food is very different. Assisi serves Umbrian farm cooking: strangozzi with black truffle, Castelluccio lentils, torta al testo, Monte Subasio olive oil and Sagrantino from Montefalco. The best of it is in side-lane trattorias and agriturismi, not the set-menu places near the basilica.

Cortina's cooking is alpine with a Venetian touch: casunziei with poppy seeds, polenta with game, barley soup. Its best meals come on rifugio terraces among the peaks. It has more polished dining rooms for its wealthy visitors, but in both towns the range is narrow and there is little street food.

Here Assisi is in a different class. The Basilica of San Francesco, with frescoes by Cimabue, Simone Martini and Lorenzetti and the cycle attributed to Giotto, is one of Europe's great monuments. The whole town of pink Subasio stone around it, from the Temple of Minerva to the Rocca Maggiore, shares its UNESCO listing.

Cortina has a pleasant centre, the ice stadium from the 1956 Olympics and three small museums, the best of which is the Rimoldi art collection. Together they fill a wet afternoon. Its most striking history is the First World War front on Lagazuoi and the Cinque Torri, which takes a day out in the mountains rather than a sightseeing stroll.

Neither is a place for nights out, but Cortina has a little more going on. There are après-ski drinks and the evening stroll along Corso Italia, and in the peak winter weeks a few smart bars and a club stay open late. In summer it is quiet.

Assisi is quieter still: dinner, a glass of Sagrantino and a walk through floodlit lanes that are empty by eleven. Anyone who wants bars heads to Perugia, half an hour away.

Cortina wins this outright. The Dolomites ring the town, and lifts from the centre climb onto the Tofane, Cristallo and Cinque Torri. The Tre Cime and Lago di Misurina are under an hour away. Winter brings world-class skiing, and summer brings hut-to-hut trails, via ferrata and climbing.

Assisi's outdoors is gentler and smaller in scale. There is the climb through holm-oak woods to the Eremo delle Carceri and the open meadows of Monte Subasio, cycling across the valley to Spello and Montefalco, and longer drives to the Valnerina or the Sibillini. It suits walkers rather than mountaineers.

Assisi is by far the better base. Spello is minutes away and Perugia and Spoleto are short train rides. Gubbio, Todi, Orvieto, Deruta and the Montefalco wine villages fill more days, and the Tuscan towns of Cortona and Montepulciano are within reach too.

From Cortina, most outings go into the mountains. The nearest towns worth a visit are San Candido, Dobbiaco and Brunico in South Tyrol. Bolzano, home of the Iceman, is about two hours away, and Venice makes a long day by coach.

Cortina is the easier choice with children, as long as they enjoy being outdoors. Ski schools, beginner slopes at Socrepes, public skating at the Olympic stadium, easy lake walks and a forest rope park keep them busy, though wet days drag and costs add up.

Assisi is calm and safe, but it is built around churches that need silence, steep stepped lanes that are hard with a pushchair and hot summer afternoons. Older children enjoy the Rocca Maggiore. Families do best staying at a valley agriturismo with a pool.

Assisi is easier to reach and to travel on from. Its centre is walkable but steep. The railway station in Santa Maria degli Angeli, about 4km below the town, has regional trains to Perugia, Spello, Foligno and Spoleto.

Cortina's flat centre is quicker on foot, but the town has had no railway since 1964. Getting there means a coach from Venice or a long drive, and buses up to the passes are limited. In both places, a hire car opens up the wider region.

Cortina has the better shopping, even though it is almost all on one street. Corso Italia has luxury fashion, jewellers and upmarket mountain wear. Its anchor is the Cooperativa di Cortina, a store founded in 1893, and there is wood carving and filigree for local craft.

Assisi's streets are mostly given over to religious souvenirs. The things worth buying there are food and crafts: embroidered Umbrian linen, Deruta ceramics, olive oil, truffles and Sagrantino.

Assisi costs far less. The basilicas are free to enter, convent guesthouses have simple rooms at low cost and valley agriturismi are good value. Only the restaurants nearest the basilicas and hotels on feast days push prices up.

Cortina is one of the most expensive resorts in Italy, with luxury hotel and restaurant prices in winter and August, plus lift passes and equipment hire. Rifugio meals and the quieter months soften the bill, but many visitors on a budget stay in cheaper valleys nearby.

Neither has a real arts calendar, but Assisi offers a little more through the year. Organ recitals and choral concerts fill its basilicas around religious feasts, the Calendimaggio festival brings medieval song and processions in spring, and a theatre in Santa Maria degli Angeli stages touring shows. Perugia is close for opera and jazz.

In Cortina, music is mostly a summer affair, with chamber and classical festivals in churches, halls and sometimes mountain settings, plus a few concerts at Christmas and New Year.

The two offer different kinds of rest. Cortina's hotels have proper Alpine spas with saunas, steam rooms, hay baths and indoor pools for after the slopes. In June and September, the quiet weeks bring clear air and slow afternoons on hut terraces.

Assisi has few treatments, mostly in country hotels in the valley, but it offers a deeper stillness: convent retreats, silent walks to the Eremo delle Carceri and evenings after the tour groups have left. Neither has thermal baths or a bathing tradition.