Cape Town or Stellenbosch?

Cape Town has its beaches inside the city: Clifton's coves and Camps Bay on the Atlantic for sunbathing below the Twelve Apostles, with icy water, and Muizenberg, St James and Boulders on False Bay for proper swims next to the penguins.

Stellenbosch has no coast of its own. The nearest sand is at Strand and the sheltered water of Gordon's Bay, half an hour's drive away on the same warm False Bay. So a beach day there has to be planned as an outing, and on hot January afternoons in town the hotel pool does the job.

The two eat equally well in very different settings. In Cape Town you eat in the city: Cape Malay curries and koeksisters from the Bo-Kaap, gatsbys from the Cape Flats, snoek at the Kalk Bay harbour, and ambitious tasting menus on Bree Street and in Woodstock's warehouses.

Stellenbosch is where those wine lists come from. Its best tables sit on the estates themselves, with tasting menus over the vines, farm lunches under oaks and summer picnics on the lawns, while the town centre is mostly student cafés and bistros. Choose Cape Town for range, Stellenbosch for the cellar door.

Cape Town has far more to see, and it is mostly about history rather than buildings: the ferry to Robben Island, the District Six Museum, the Castle of Good Hope, and the museums and Parliament around the Company's Garden, with Zeitz MOCAA adding world-class contemporary African art.

Stellenbosch is the opposite. Its whitewashed Cape Dutch houses, gables and oak avenues along Dorp Street and around the Braak form a more complete old townscape than anything in Cape Town, but the Village Museum and the Moederkerk take a day or two at most.

Cape Town has a real night out: rowdy bars on Long Street, cocktail and wine bars on Bree and Kloof Street, De Waterkant's gay quarter, and summer sundowners at Camps Bay before the clubs. You will need ride-hailing between areas after dark.

Stellenbosch's evenings depend on the university. In term, student pubs and a few dance venues around Bird Street and Plein Street get loud at weekends; in the vacations, and for most visitors anyway, a night means dinner, a glass on a terrace and bed.

Cape Town comes out ahead because the wild landscape is the city itself: Table Mountain by cableway or Platteklip Gorge, sunrise on Lion's Head, the cliffs of Cape Point, penguins at Boulders, whales in False Bay, surfing at Muizenberg and the drive along Chapman's Peak.

Stellenbosch is still superb for the outdoors in a quieter way. The Jonkershoek trails start at the edge of town, the valley is one of the country's main mountain-biking centres with singletrack through the wine farms, and road cyclists take on the passes. Kogelberg's fynbos lies over Sir Lowry's Pass.

Stellenbosch is the better base for days out because it sits in the middle of them. Franschhoek is half an hour over the Helshoogte Pass, Paarl and Wellington are close, and Cape Town itself, with Robben Island and the Waterfront, is under an hour away.

From Cape Town the Winelands are still an easy day, and Hermanus brings whale watching from the cliffs, but beyond the vineyards the choice is thinner. In both places nearly every trip needs a car or a booked tour.

Children get far more out of Cape Town. The Two Oceans Aquarium, the penguins at Boulders, the cableway ride up Table Mountain, Kirstenbosch's treetop walkway and the calm tidal pools at St James and Fish Hoek add up to a week of easy outings. You still need a car to link them, and the Atlantic is too cold for long swims.

Stellenbosch is relaxed, but it is built around adults who like wine. Some estates add playgrounds, farm animals and picnic lawns, there is a small wildlife park outside town, and the Jonkershoek trails suit older children. The summer heat is hard on little ones, though, so most families drive into Cape Town for the big days.

Neither is a place to do without a car, but Cape Town gives you a little more help. The City Bowl, Bo-Kaap and Waterfront are walkable by day, and MyCiTi buses run to the airport, the Atlantic beaches and Hout Bay, with cheap ride-hailing for the rest.

Stellenbosch's centre is small, flat and pleasant on foot, but the estates are spread along winding valley roads with no useful public transport. Hop-on hop-off wine tours are the practical answer, since they also take drinking and driving out of the day.

Cape Town gives you more to browse: the V&A Waterfront mall with its makers' hall, local design and fashion in Woodstock and on Bree and Kloof Street, and African crafts at Greenmarket Square.

Stellenbosch shopping is mostly about taking the valley home. You buy wine at the cellar door, with shipping from many estates, plus galleries and ceramics along Dorp Street, an old-fashioned general store full of preserves and curios, and weekend farm markets. For fashion, people drive to Cape Town.

Both are good value for visitors from Europe or North America, and Cape Town is slightly kinder overall. Tasting menus, wine and ride-hailing all cost little there. The catch is rooms in Camps Bay and Clifton over the December to January peak.

Stellenbosch is one of the pricier towns in the country, though tastings and estate lunches still cost far less than in other famous wine regions, and guesthouses are fair. What adds up is the hire car or tours you can't really do without.

Neither is a place people travel to for the stage. Cape Town has a modest city programme, though, where Stellenbosch has a thin town one. Its real distinction is Cape jazz, the sound Abdullah Ibrahim carried abroad, which lives on in a few clubs and at one of the continent's biggest jazz festivals, while Artscape, the Baxter and the summer Sunday concerts on Kirstenbosch's lawns are enough for a couple of good evenings in a week.

Stellenbosch offers a few dates in the year rather than a season. The autumn Afrikaans arts festival fills halls and gardens with theatre, music and readings for about ten days. Otherwise there are term-time concerts at the university conservatorium and summer evenings in a wine-estate amphitheatre, and for opera or ballet you drive to Cape Town.

Neither has thermal baths or a bathing culture, and both offer good spas in their better hotels and estates. The difference is in the kind of calm. Cape Town's version is by the sea: year-round morning swims in the False Bay tidal pools, yoga on the Atlantic seaboard and slow afternoons in Kalk Bay. Stellenbosch's is rural and quieter still, with shaded verandas, mountain gardens and empty valleys.