Bratislava or Nuremberg?

Neither city is a place to swim, and the difference is how far you go for a lake. In Bratislava, the sandy shore at Zlate piesky is a tram ride from the centre and the larger Senec lakes are half an hour out. Nuremberg's Franconian Lake District, with the Brombachsee as its biggest reservoir, is about an hour south, so in town a swim means an outdoor pool or a leisure bath.

Bratislava's Slovak farm and mountain cooking is as hearty as anything in Franconia, though it has less of a signature than Nuremberg's. You get sheep's cheese dumplings with bacon, cabbage soup and roast duck with lokse, but the central streets lean towards tourist menus and the good meals take some finding. Where it stands out is wine: Veltliner, Riesling and Frankovka from the Small Carpathian vineyards at the city's edge, rarely sold abroad.

Nuremberg's food is better known and easier to find. Finger-sized bratwurst come off the beechwood grill, Schäufele with crackling is the Sunday dish and Lebkuchen is sold all year. Franconia's many small breweries fill the taverns and Pegnitz beer gardens with smoky Kellerbier, so beer drinkers will be happier here, while wine drinkers get more from Bratislava.

Bratislava's Old Town is small and well kept: St Martin's Cathedral with brass crowns in the pavement marking the coronation route, the Primate's Palace, the Blue Church, the castle museum and the cliff-top ruins of Devin. A day or two covers it all.

Nuremberg has a good deal more. Inside its almost complete walls are the Kaiserburg, the Gothic churches of St Sebaldus and St Lorenz and Dürer's half-timbered house, and the Germanisches Nationalmuseum can take a whole day on its own. The Rally Grounds documentation centre and Courtroom 600 tell a heavy twentieth-century story, where Bratislava offers the communist-era Most SNP bridge.

Both cities are for a good evening in bars rather than a reason to travel for clubs, but the mood differs. Bratislava's Old Town gets loud and packed on Friday and Saturday nights, when cheap drinks bring in weekend groups and stag parties, and then goes quiet during the week. Nuremberg is calmer, and its most interesting nights are in Gostenhof, where small bars and alternative venues fill the old working-class streets west of the walls.

Both offer gentle country with no mountains, and they are closely matched. Bratislava's trails start at the city's edge in the Little Carpathians and climb through beech woods to Kamzik. The Danube adds floodplain forests, a flat cycle route into Austria and whitewater rafting at Cunovo.

Nuremberg's pine-covered Reichswald is good for easy walks, but its best walking country is Franconian Switzerland, about an hour away, with limestone towers, caves, trails between villages and well-known rock climbing. Choose Bratislava for river and vineyard country, Nuremberg for crags and valleys.

Bratislava is the base for crossing borders. Vienna is about an hour by train or a boat ride up the Danube, and Roman Carnuntum, the chateaux of Lednice-Valtice and the abbey at Pannonhalma put Austria, the Czech Republic and Hungary within a day. Closer still, the Small Carpathian wine villages and Cerveny Kamen castle make an easy half day.

From Nuremberg the outings are German historic towns instead. Bamberg, Regensburg and Würzburg are each about an hour by train, the walled towns of Rothenburg and Dinkelsbühl on the Romantic Road a little further, and Munich is close on a fast train. You stay in one country, but the rail network makes it easy to see a different old town every day.

Bratislava is safe and calm, and children enjoy spotting the bronze statues, the chairlift and playgrounds at Kamzik, the hillside zoo and the water park at Senec. After two or three days, though, there is little left to do with them.

Nuremberg is much better set up for children. Its long toy-making history shows in the Toy Museum, the railway museum has the first German train, the large zoo has a dolphin and manatee house, and a toy brand's play park in Zirndorf has climbing frames and water play. In Advent, a separate children's market with carousels adds one more treat.

Both centres are easy to walk, each with a steep but short climb up to the castle. Bratislava's trams, trolleybuses and buses cover the rest of the city, but there is no metro, so trips across the river or out to the suburbs take longer than you would expect.

Nuremberg is easier. The walled centre is about 1.5km across, the main station is just outside the southern gate, and the U-Bahn, trams and S-Bahn reach the zoo, the Rally Grounds, Fürth and Erlangen quickly. Regional trains handle the day trips, whereas in Bratislava a car helps for the castles and wine villages off the rail lines.

Neither city is a shopping destination, but Nuremberg gives you more reason to browse. In Bratislava the best buys are at the state folk-craft centre, which sells Modra majolica, lace and blue-print cloth, along with bottles of Small Carpathian wine. Beyond that the malls stock international chains, and for fashion people take the train to Vienna.

Nuremberg has Lebkuchen in decorated tins, wooden toys and tin figures, and the craft workshops of the Handwerkerhof by the station gate. In Advent the Christkindlesmarkt, one of Germany's oldest Christmas markets, makes the Hauptmarkt the place to shop.

Bratislava is the cheaper of the two day to day. Beer, wine, transport and museums cost little and pub lunch menus are generous, and only the main squares and the glass complexes by the Danube charge Western prices. Nuremberg is fair rather than cheap. Tavern meals and local beer are good value, but trade-fair weeks and the Advent season make hotel rooms scarce and expensive, so your dates matter more there.

Bratislava is the place for a classic indoor evening, Nuremberg for summer performances out of doors. In Bratislava, opera and ballet play in the ornate Slovak National Theatre on Hviezdoslav Square and tickets are easy to get. The Slovak Philharmonic performs in the Reduta, and an autumn music festival and a jazz festival add to the season.

Nuremberg's Art Nouveau Staatstheater adds drama to its opera and ballet, but its summers are what set it apart. The Bardentreffen brings free folk and world music to the old town squares, the orchestras give a large open-air concert in the Luitpoldhain, and a big rock festival takes over the ground by the Zeppelinfeld.

Bratislava has no thermal baths of its own, so relaxing there means hotel spas, slow café afternoons and quiet forest paths. For real bathing you need a day out to the Senec water park or the spa town of Piestany, known for its mud and sulphur-water cures.

Nuremberg makes it easier to unwind. A large thermal spa with sauna gardens in Fürth is a short U-Bahn ride away, the leisure pools on the edge of the city have mixed nude saunas, and Bad Windsheim's saline pools, where you can float, are about an hour west. Afternoons in the beer gardens along the Pegnitz are the local way to slow down.