Avignon or Bern?

Neither city has a beach, but Bern makes more of its water. On summer afternoons people walk upstream and float back down the cold, fast Aare to the Marzili lido, with its lawns and pools. Lake Thun, about twenty minutes away by train, has calmer bathing.

In Avignon the Rhône is not safe for swimming. A swim means driving about half an hour to the Gardon pools below the Pont du Gard, or well over an hour to the sands of the Camargue, so most visitors use the pool where they are staying.

Avignon is the better place to eat. Its Provençal cooking uses produce from the surrounding plain: daube, tians, goat's cheese and apricots. At Les Halles, small counters cook lunch from what the market sells, and bistros in the side streets pour Châteauneuf-du-Pape and Côtes du Rhône by the glass.

Bern's cooking is heavier and Alpine: the Berner Platte, rösti and fondue, served in guildhall dining rooms and vaulted cellars. The chocolate is excellent and Emmental cheese fills the markets, but eating out is expensive and rarely surprising.

Both are UNESCO-listed old towns that two days will cover, and they are much the same in weight. Avignon's draw is one huge building, the Palais des Papes. Around it are the broken bridge, nearly 4km of ramparts and the Italian primitives of the Petit Palais.

In Bern the whole townscape is the sight rather than a single monument: arcaded sandstone streets, painted fountains and the Zytglogge clock tower. Its museums have a more modern bent, with the Zentrum Paul Klee and Einstein's flat on Kramgasse.

Both cities are quiet at night, in different ways. In Avignon an evening out means an aperitif on Place Pie or a glass of Côtes du Rhône on a terrace. The big exception is July, when the festival keeps the squares full until the small hours.

Bern's nightlife is spread more evenly through the year. There are cellar bars under the arcades, busy weekends on Aarbergergasse and riverside terraces in summer. For late, rough-edged parties there is the Reitschule, which has no equivalent in Avignon.

Bern has the Alps on its horizon, and they are only an hour away by train. Around Interlaken there is high-mountain hiking, cable cars and winter skiing. There are lakeside paths at Thun, and from town a funicular climbs the Gurten hill. Hardly any of it needs a car.

Avignon's countryside is fine in a southern way: Mont Ventoux for road cyclists, the ochre trails of the Luberon, the Alpilles and the flamingos of the Camargue. Most of it is a drive away, though, and the summer heat means it is best in spring and autumn.

Both are excellent bases, and Avignon has slightly more around it. There are the Roman arenas of Nîmes and Arles, the theatre at Orange, the Pont du Gard, Les Baux and the Luberon villages, and Marseille and Aix are a short train ride away. The catch is that the villages and vineyards need a car.

Bern makes up for some of that with ease. From the central station you can reach Lucerne, Basel, Zurich, Fribourg, Murten and Thun without planning around connections, so you can see a different town every day for a week by train alone.

Bern is the easier city with children. The bear park, the Dählhölzli zoo, the animal dioramas at the Natural History Museum and the Gurten meadows are all easy to reach, and trams and buses are easy with a pushchair. The one caution is the Aare, which is for strong swimmers only.

Avignon has a few things children enjoy: the tablet tour of the Palais des Papes, dancing on the bridge from the song and the playground in the Rocher des Doms. But the cobbled lanes tire small legs, and the bigger days out, such as canoeing at the Pont du Gard, are outside town.

You can walk across either old town in about twenty minutes, so the difference is in what lies beyond. Bern's trams, buses and funiculars run on one fare system with Swiss punctuality. The arcades keep you dry, and the station sits at the top of the old town.

Avignon is easy on foot, and regional trains go to Arles and Nîmes. But buses to the hill villages and Mont Ventoux are sparse, and the TGV station is a shuttle ride from the walls.

Neither city is a shopping destination, but Bern has a little more. Watch and chocolate shops line the arcaded streets, cellar shops on Gerechtigkeitsgasse sell antiques, design and books, and a large shopping centre on the western edge covers the mainstream brands.

Avignon's shops are Provençal: printed cottons, lavender and olive wood in the lanes around Rue des Marchands. The best things to take home are edible ones from Les Halles, and serious antique hunters go out to L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue.

This is the widest gap between the two. Avignon has the prices of a provincial French town. Set lunches are fair and wine from the producers is good value, and only the July festival pushes up the price of rooms inside the walls.

Bern is very expensive across the board, from simple guesthouses to a dinner with wine. Hotels usually give guests a pass for local transport, and the bear park, the river paths and tours of the Federal Palace are free. Even so, a stay in Bern costs far more.

Avignon has the stronger stage, largely because of July. The Festival d'Avignon puts on major productions in the Cour d'honneur of the Palais des Papes, and the Off fringe fills every cellar and courtyard in town. The rest of the year, the Opéra Grand Avignon and a dozen small theatres keep up a regular programme.

Bern has the steady programme of a small capital: opera and drama in German at the Stadttheater, the symphony orchestra at the Casino and new dance at the Dampfzentrale. There is plenty for an evening, but nothing worth planning a trip around.

Bern is the better place to switch off. A large thermal complex on the western edge has warm pools, saunas and steam rooms, and the old town has a hammam-style spa. Quiet Sundays and long lunches on riverside terraces set an unhurried pace, and the mountain spa hotels of the Bernese Oberland are close by.

Avignon relies on hotel spas and a few day spas, and its rest comes from long lunches under the plane trees. Many visitors who want quiet stay in farmhouses among the vineyards outside the walls, because July in town is anything but calm.