Chamonix or La Spezia?

La Spezia has the sea and Chamonix does not. Around the gulf you get sheltered sand at San Terenzo and Lerici, clear rocky water off Portovenere and Palmaria, and the long sandy beach at Monterosso up the line. Swimming is pleasant from June into early October, though the beaches are small, often pebbly, and much of the shore belongs to paid bathing establishments.

In Chamonix, swimming is an afternoon off. The choice is Lac de Passy below the Mont Blanc massif, Lake Annecy a little over an hour away, or the town pool with its summer outdoor basin.

Chamonix has the wider range of restaurants. Alongside fondue, raclette and tartiflette made with Reblochon and Beaufort from the alpages, often eaten on refuge terraces facing the glaciers, there are bistros, pizza and burger places, and a few ambitious kitchens in the grand old hotels. It is still resort eating, though: menus look alike, dining rooms are packed in high season, and many places close between winter and summer.

La Spezia eats better from day to day, and its food is more clearly its own. Farinata comes out of wood ovens, mussels are farmed on ropes off Portovenere, pesto goes on trofie and testaroli, and the covered market on Piazza Cavour sells the morning's fish, with Colli di Luni whites to drink alongside. Prices and quality are steadier than in the Cinque Terre villages, even though fine dining and international food are scarce.

Neither is a heritage city, but La Spezia has more to fill a day indoors. The Museo Amedeo Lia holds early Italian paintings, the Castello San Giorgio houses the strange Lunigiana stele statues, and the naval museum and the Liberty-style streets of the nineteenth-century centre add to them.

Chamonix's culture is the history of mountaineering, from the first ascent of Mont Blanc to the 1924 Winter Olympics. The Musée Alpin and the climbers' cemetery tell that story well, and half a day covers it.

Chamonix goes out harder. In winter, après-ski starts at the foot of the slopes in late afternoon, then moves to the pubs on a narrow old-town lane, where guides and seasonal workers stay late. A couple of small clubs carry on into the early hours. The crowd is young and largely English-speaking, and summer nights are calmer.

La Spezia's evening is an aperitivo along Via del Prione or the seafront, or by the water at Lerici in summer. After that, most people go to bed early, ready for the trails in the morning.

Both are outdoor destinations, but Chamonix plays at a different scale. The Aiguille du Midi lifts you to 3,842m among hanging glaciers, the Mer de Glace and Lac Blanc are reachable on rails and lifts, and the Tour du Mont Blanc starts in the valley. Winter adds steep skiing and the Vallée Blanche, and summer adds guided alpinism and paragliding.

La Spezia's landscape is coastal. Terraced cliffs fall into the sea along the Cinque Terre paths, there is a loop walk on Palmaria and kayaking and diving in the gulf. The marble peaks of the Apuan Alps rise about an hour inland.

La Spezia is the better base for days out by some distance. The Cinque Terre villages are minutes away by train, Portovenere is a short boat ride, and walled Sarzana and Roman Luni are close. Pisa and Lucca are about an hour away, with Portofino and Genoa along the Riviera.

Chamonix's trips cross borders: Courmayeur and Roman Aosta through the tunnel, Annecy and Geneva by road, and Martigny on the Mont Blanc Express. Beyond those, most places in reach are other ski resorts, and the mountain roads make every journey slow.

Chamonix gives outdoor families more to do. There are ski schools and sledging in winter, and in summer a luge, treetop courses, the Merlet animal park with ibex and marmots, and the little red train to the Mer de Glace. The caveats are the high cable cars, which are not suitable for small children, and the lack of options on rainy days.

La Spezia is easy with a pushchair and has calm, shallow water at San Terenzo and boat trips round the islands. With no zoo or aquarium, and with steep villages and crowded trains, it suits older children better.

Both are easy without a car, but for different kinds of journey. Chamonix's buses and valley train run along a single valley and are free with the guest card, and the Aiguille du Midi and Montenvers stations are in town. The weak spot is the crowded ski buses in winter.

La Spezia is a rail and ferry hub. Trains run along the coast and inland, buses go round the gulf and boats serve the villages, but the coastal trains get packed in summer.

Shopping is limited in both, and what is worth buying is quite different. Chamonix's pedestrian streets are full of long-established climbing and ski shops whose technical gear draws serious mountaineers, along with Savoyard cheese, génépi and rock crystals.

In La Spezia you get an ordinary Italian high street on Via del Prione and Corso Cavour, and the best things to take home are edible: pesto, olive oil, Sciacchetrà and anchovies. For fashion, Chamonix visitors go to Geneva or Annecy.

La Spezia is much easier on the wallet. It is a mid-priced provincial port where trains and buses cost little and rooms are cheaper than in the Cinque Terre villages. The extras that add up are park trail passes, boat trips and sunbeds, and summer rooms still cost what they do elsewhere in Western Europe.

Chamonix is expensive at every level, from rooms in the school vacations to lift passes, guides and resort meals. Free valley transport, self-catering, picnics and the trails that start from the valley floor all help, as do the quieter shoulder months.

Neither place has much of a stage, but La Spezia at least has a season. The Teatro Civico puts on prose theatre, touring productions and concerts, the old Teatro degli Impavidi is in Sarzana nearby, and summer brings open-air concerts in castle courtyards.

Chamonix has a summer jazz festival, with some sets played high in the mountains, and mountain film evenings, and very little beyond that. For opera, one goes to Geneva and the other to Genoa or Pisa.

Chamonix is the better place to recover. It has a large spa with hot outdoor pools and saunas looking up at the glaciers, many chalets have their own saunas, and the thermal springs at Saint-Gervais are in a wooded gorge down the valley. The town itself is busy and starts early, though.

La Spezia has no bathing tradition beyond hotel spas and the small baths at Equi Terme inland. What it offers instead is a slower pace: long lunches in Tellaro and quiet days on Palmaria out of season.