Bratislava or Venice?

Bratislava has no coast, and the Danube is too fast and too busy with barges for a dip. Summer swimming means the Zlate piesky lake at the end of a tram line or the Senec lakes half an hour out. Both are fine on a hot afternoon but crowded at weekends, and the season is short.

Venice has the real beach of the two. The Lido's long stretch of fine sand faces the open Adriatic a short vaporetto ride from San Marco, and its shallow, warm water suits children. Pellestrina is quieter still. Few visitors plan a stay around the sea, but a proper beach afternoon is there if you want one.

Bratislava serves hearty food: sheep's cheese dumplings, roast duck with lokse, poppy-seed Bratislava rolls and lager from small house breweries. The real draw is the Small Carpathian wine, Veltliner and Frankovka that rarely leave the country.

Venice gives you more to seek out. Eating cicchetti and drinking a spritz standing at a bacaro counter, then lagoon dishes such as cuttlefish-ink risotto made with produce from the Rialto market, turns eating into part of the sightseeing. Both cities stick to their own regional cooking and both have tourist menus on the main squares, so in each the better meals are a few streets back.

This is where the two differ most. Bratislava's Old Town is a pleasant, compact baroque quarter. It has St Martin's Cathedral with the brass crowns marking the coronation route, the Blue Church, the castle above and the cliff-top ruins of Devin, and you can see it all in a day or two.

Venice is a whole city of palaces on water. San Marco, the Doge's Palace and the Grand Canal come before you even reach the Accademia, Titian in the Frari, Tintoretto at San Rocco, the Guggenheim and the Biennale. A week there still leaves a lot unseen.

Bratislava is the livelier choice after dark. Its Old Town pubs, wine bars and cocktail bars stay loud until late on Fridays and Saturdays, helped by students and weekend groups from abroad. Expect a bar crawl rather than a club scene.

In Venice the evening peaks at aperitivo time around the Rialto and the Fondamenta della Misericordia, and Campo Santa Margherita stays busy a little later. By midnight the canals are silent, which suits a late walk better than a late night.

Bratislava has more countryside to walk in. Beech-wood trails climb from the edge of town to Kamzik and carry on along the Little Carpathian ridge, Devinska Kobyla has steppe meadows, and the flat Danube cycle route runs into Austria.

In Venice the outdoors is the lagoon itself. There are quiet marshes around Torcello with herons and flamingos, kayaking or Venetian rowing, and cycling along the Lido sea walls. There is little green space in the city, though, and the nearest hills are about an hour away.

Both are excellent bases, but Venice comes out slightly ahead. Bratislava's strongest card is Vienna, an hour by train or a boat ride up the Danube. The Small Carpathian wine villages, Trnava, Roman Carnuntum and Lake Neusiedl add three countries' worth of variety close by.

From Venice, fast trains put Padua, Vicenza and Verona within easy reach, each with major art and architecture. The lagoon islands of Murano, Burano and Torcello make a full day out without boarding a train at all.

Neither city is built around children, and the two are much alike for families, but the difficulties differ. Bratislava is easy and calm, with a mostly pedestrian Old Town, bronze statues to spot, the chairlift and playgrounds at Kamzik, the hillside zoo and the Senec water park. The options run thin after a few days.

Venice excites children more, with boats instead of buses, glass-blowing on Murano and the shallow Lido beach. On the other hand, the stepped bridges defeat pushchairs and the summer crowds and heat tire small children, so it works better with older ones.

Both centres are best seen on foot, but in very different ways. Bratislava's sights lie within twenty minutes' walk, and trams, trolleybuses and buses reach Kamzik, the zoo and Devin. The lack of a metro only slows longer trips to the suburbs.

Venice has no road traffic at all, so walking and the vaporetto are the whole system. Distances are longer, the alleys confuse, and the stepped bridges make luggage hard work, though the boats out to Murano, Burano and the Lido are a pleasure in themselves.

Bratislava's shopping is modest. The state folk-craft centre's majolica, lace and blue-print cloth are worth a look, and Small Carpathian wine is the best thing to take home. For serious fashion, people take the train to Vienna.

Venice is the more rewarding place to shop because its crafts are still made in the city: Murano glass, Burano lace, papier-mâché masks, marbled paper and furlane slippers. The big Italian fashion names line the Mercerie. The skill is finding the real workshops and avoiding the imported copies on the main routes.

Bratislava is far easier on the wallet. Local beer and wine, public transport and museums cost little, pub lunch menus are hearty, and a modest budget covers a central room. Only the main squares and the riverside complexes charge Western prices.

Venice is one of the most expensive places to stay in Italy, from hotel rooms near San Marco to the vaporetto and church entry. Eating standing at a bacaro counter, sleeping in Mestre or coming in late autumn or winter softens the cost, but it never becomes cheap.

Bratislava offers solid, easily booked opera and ballet at the Slovak National Theatre on Hviezdoslav Square, and Slovak Philharmonic concerts in the Reduta. That makes a relaxed night out from autumn to spring.

Venice has the bigger name and a deeper programme. La Fenice, where Verdi and Rossini premiered works, runs a full season, and the Biennale adds contemporary music, theatre and dance. Vivaldi concerts in churches fill most evenings, uneven in quality but memorable in the city where he worked.

Neither city has thermal baths of its own, so both rely on hotel spas and a day out. From Bratislava that means the Senec water park or the spa town of Piestany. From Venice it means the Euganean mud and pools of Abano and Montegrotto.

The calm differs in kind. Bratislava is unhurried all day, with quiet forest paths above the town on weekdays. Venice is hushed at dawn and late in the evening and in Castello, Cannaregio and Giudecca, but crowded around San Marco by day.