Canberra or Melbourne?

Canberra is inland, and the nearest sea is a two-hour drive over the Clyde Mountain to Batemans Bay. Summer swimming close to the city means river spots such as Casuarina Sands and Kambah Pool, with no lifeguards, while algae often closes Lake Burley Griffin after warm weather.

Melbourne has real beaches a tram ride from the centre. St Kilda, Elwood and Brighton with its bathing boxes face the calm water of Port Phillip Bay, and the Mornington Peninsula offers more sand and surf. The season is short, but a beach afternoon is a normal part of a summer stay.

Melbourne is a city people visit to eat. Generations of migration fill Greek tavernas on Lonsdale Street, Italian Carlton, Vietnamese Richmond and a large Chinatown, and Queen Victoria Market and the laneway espresso bars add to that. Canberra eats well but on a much smaller scale, mostly brunch cafés in Braddon and the Asian kitchens of Dickson's Woolley Street.

Canberra's own strength is wine. Cellar doors around Murrumbateman, many under forty minutes from the centre, pour cool-climate riesling and shiraz-viognier, and you can reach them more easily than Melbourne's Yarra Valley.

The two are about even here, but they offer different things. Canberra is a city of national institutions: Parliament House under its grass roof, the Australian War Memorial, the National Gallery's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander collection, all set into Walter Burley Griffin's planned landscape. There is almost no old streetscape, so you go from museum to museum rather than wander.

Melbourne is the place to wander. Its gold-rush wealth left Victorian arcades, bluestone lanes, Flinders Street Station and the Royal Exhibition Building, and the street art in the laneways is part of the visit. The National Gallery of Victoria carries the museum side.

Melbourne is one of Australia's best cities for going out. Hidden cocktail and wine bars across the CBD, pubs and late bars on Brunswick and Smith streets and clubs on Chapel Street keep it busy most nights of the week.

Canberra's evenings centre on Lonsdale Street in Braddon and a few Civic laneways. They suit a quiet drink after dinner, and outside parliamentary sitting weeks and university term the city goes very still.

Both are strong outdoor bases, but for different kinds of landscape. Canberra has the wild country closer: eucalypt hills like Mount Ainslie and Black Mountain run between the suburbs, kangaroos graze on the reserves at dusk, and Namadgi's granite summits above 1,800m, with rock-art sites, are only forty minutes away.

Melbourne itself is flat parkland and river paths, so its nature lies further out, and it adds the coast Canberra lacks. That means tall mountain ash forest in the Dandenongs, cliff walks on the Mornington Peninsula, the surf coast at Torquay, and penguins and fur seals on Phillip Island.

Melbourne has more places worth a day out. The Yarra Valley and Mornington Peninsula pair wine with food or seaside villages, Ballarat and Bendigo show off gold-rush grandeur and can be reached by train, and Daylesford brings spa towns into the mix.

Canberra's outings are quieter and need a car: the cellar doors of the Yass Valley, galleries in Bungendore, and Braidwood, the best of its heritage towns. They make pleasant drives, but none is a reason to come on its own.

Both work well with children, in different ways. Canberra has Questacon, which can fill a whole day with hands-on science, plus Tidbinbilla's kangaroos and the Arboretum playground, all in a calm city where nothing is crowded, though a car makes the distances easier.

Melbourne offers more variety and is easier without a car. Trams and flat streets are good for prams, and there are three different zoos, Luna Park at St Kilda, the Puffing Billy steam railway and an evening penguin parade. Neither city has a theme park.

Melbourne is far easier without a car. Its flat central grid is walkable, trams are free within the CBD and run out to Fitzroy, Carlton and St Kilda, and regional trains reach Ballarat and Bendigo.

Canberra was built around the car. Its institutions are spread along wide avenues around the lake, there is just one light rail line, and buses thin out in the evenings. The off-road cycle paths are the pleasant way round, but Namadgi and the wineries need a car.

Melbourne gives shopping real character. You have mosaic-floored arcades and luxury labels at the top of Collins Street, and independent designers, vintage and homeware shops along Gertrude and Smith streets.

In Canberra shopping is mostly practical, centred on the Canberra Centre mall. Its best finds are at the Old Bus Depot Markets in Kingston on Sunday mornings and in the national museum shops, which are good for Aboriginal art prints.

Neither is cheap, as both charge Australian prices for meals, drinks and taxis. Canberra comes out a little gentler because almost all its main sights are free and hotel rooms often get cheaper at weekends, when the political and business travellers leave. Hiring a car eats into that saving.

Melbourne's central hotels are pricey, especially around major sporting events and festivals. The free tram zone, free museums and cheap noodle houses in Footscray and Richmond help keep the daily spend down.

Melbourne is the place to plan a trip around a show. The Arts Centre on St Kilda Road is home to the Australian Ballet and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, the old theatres on the east side of the CBD stage the big musicals, and pub band rooms in Fitzroy and St Kilda have live music most nights. The autumn Comedy Festival adds weeks of shows.

Canberra has the Canberra Theatre Centre for touring productions and the Canberra Symphony Orchestra's season. Its best moment is the National Folk Festival at Easter.

Melbourne has far more for a restorative stay. The sea baths at St Kilda and Brighton put pools and saunas beside the bay, and day trips reach the old mineral springs of Daylesford and Hepburn Springs or the geothermal pools on the Mornington Peninsula.

Canberra has only a few day spas. What restores you there is the pace: quiet lakeside mornings, uncrowded green spaces and early evenings.