Bern or Pisa?

Pisa has real sea bathing: wide sandy beaches backed by pine woods at Tirrenia and Calambrone, about 12km from the centre, with shallow water near 25°C in high summer. The catch is that the water near the river mouth is rarely clear, and most of the shore is taken up by rented beach establishments.

Bern's swimming is a different experience altogether. You drift down the cold, fast Aare from the Marzili lido past the Federal Palace, which is thrilling for strong swimmers and unsuitable for small children. Lake Thun gives calmer water, but the season is short.

Pisa eats better and more cheaply. Hot cecina from wood ovens, ribollita and wild boar are served in the trattorias around the Piazza delle Vettovaglie market, where student custom keeps standards honest. Just avoid the menus by the tower.

Bern's cooking is heavier and more Alpine: the Berner Platte, rösti and fondue in vaulted cellars, with Emmental cheese at the markets and very good chocolate. The choice is limited and every meal out is expensive, so eating is rarely a highlight of a stay.

The two are closely matched, and each needs about two days, but the appeal differs. Pisa is built around one world-famous ensemble, the marble cathedral, baptistery, tower and Camposanto on their lawn. Beyond it lie quieter rewards: medieval Pisan art at San Matteo and the tiny Santa Maria della Spina on the Arno.

In Bern the sight is the whole old town rather than a single square: arcaded sandstone streets, painted fountains and the Zytglogge. It also has the stronger museums, with the Paul Klee collection, Switzerland's oldest art museum and Einstein's flat on Kramgasse.

Neither is a place to go out late, but the evenings feel different. Bern drinks indoors in cellar bars under the arcades and around Aarbergergasse. The Reitschule offers rough-edged late parties for anyone who wants them, and summer brings people out to the Aare terraces.

Pisa's evenings happen outdoors. During term, students fill the small squares by the old market, and the aperitivo crowd walks Borgo Stretto. Outside term and summer, both towns go quiet early.

Bern has the landscape advantage by a wide margin. The Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau are visible from the old town and about an hour away, with high hiking, cable cars and skiing. Closer to town there are the Gurten, wooded river paths and the rolling Emmental.

Pisa's outdoors is flatter and coastal. The San Rossore park has pine forest, dunes and fallow deer at the city's edge, and the Monte Pisano has olive-terrace walks. Real mountains mean the Apuan Alps, further out, and summer on the plain is too hot for much exertion.

Both are superb bases, but Pisa's list is the more famous. Florence is about an hour away, walled Lucca under half an hour, and the Cinque Terre a little over an hour by train. A car opens up Volterra, San Gimignano and Chianti.

From Bern, Lucerne, Basel and Zurich are each about an hour by rail, with Fribourg, Gruyères, Murten and Thun closer still. These are smaller-scale places than Florence, but every one is reachable without a car or any planning around connections.

Bern is easier with children. The bear park below the old town, the Dählhölzli zoo along the Aare, the animal dioramas at the Natural History Museum and the playground on the Gurten fill several days. The fast river is the one real hazard.

Pisa offers less made for children: the tower photo, a climb that younger children are not allowed to make, and gelato in the squares. Its trump card is the shallow sandy beach at Tirrenia, though midsummer heat needs planning around.

Bern is the smoother of the two. The station sits at the top of a compact old town you can cross on foot in about twenty minutes, under arcades that keep the rain off. Punctual trams and funiculars cover the steep bits down to the river.

Pisa is also car-free and flat, but more spread out. It is about half an hour on foot from the station to the tower, and buses to the beaches are slow. Its real convenience is the airport, linked to the station by a short shuttle train.

Neither is a shopping destination, but Bern has a little more to browse. Its arcaded run of Spitalgasse, Marktgasse and Kramgasse sells watches and chocolate. Down on Gerechtigkeitsgasse, cellar shops reached by steep steps sell antiques, design and crafts.

Pisa offers everyday Italian high-street shopping on Corso Italia and smarter shoes on Borgo Stretto, plus a monthly antiques market by the river. For serious fashion, people head to Florence.

This is the widest gap between the two. Bern is very expensive across the board, from simple rooms to a terrace beer. Free sights like the bear park, the river paths and the transport pass most hotels hand out soften the cost only a little.

Pisa is moderately priced for a famous Italian city, with good-value student trattorias and a centre you can walk. The costs gather in a few places: the tower climb, the cafés beside it and beach loungers in high summer.

Bern has more on stage. The Stadttheater offers opera, ballet and German-language drama, the Bern Symphony Orchestra plays at the Casino, and the Dampfzentrale stages new dance. A spring jazz festival and the Gurtenfestival in July add to the year.

Pisa's live culture centres on the horseshoe-shaped Teatro Verdi, with opera and concerts from autumn to spring, plus chamber music from the university. There is little jazz or touring music.

Both are quiet towns for slowing down, and the difference lies in the water. Pisa has genuine thermal history: the springs of San Giuliano Terme, used since Roman times, feed a spa in an 18th-century bath palace just outside town, and Casciana Terme has a larger public pool.

Bern has no bathing tradition. It relies on a modern thermal complex on the city's edge and a hammam-style spa, while serious spa hotels are up in the Oberland.