Cinque Terre or French Alps?

Cinque Terre has the sea, clear and warm through the summer, but full beach days only really work in Monterosso, at Fegina and the cove by the old town. Elsewhere you swim off rock shelves and slipways at Vernazza, Manarola and Riomaggiore.

The French Alps have lake bathing instead. There are grassy public beaches and jetties around Lake Annecy, the quieter Lac du Bourget, and pebbly lidos on Lake Geneva. The water is pleasant from late June to early September, but the beaches are small and few people travel for them, so the Ligurian sea comes out ahead.

Cinque Terre's kitchen is Ligurian and coastal: trofie with pesto, focaccia, Monterosso's anchovies and the sweet Sciacchetrà. The range is narrow, and the better meals are in Monterosso or the hilltop villages rather than on the busy harbours.

The Alps eat richer and over a wider range. Savoyard cheese dishes and Reblochon or Beaufort bought at the farm sit alongside perch from the lakes and the markets of Annecy. The shores of Lake Annecy, Megève and Courchevel also have some of France's most decorated mountain kitchens, a top level the Ligurian villages cannot match, even if resort menus repeat the melted cheese.

In Cinque Terre the sight is the coast itself: the UNESCO-listed terraces and the villages stacked above the sea, with striped Ligurian Gothic churches and the Doria tower but no museum of any size. A day or two covers it.

The Alps give you more to fill a rainy day. There is Annecy's old town with its canals and the Palais de l'Isle, the ducal château in Chambéry, Grenoble's fine-arts museum and the Vauban walls of Briançon. These are still half-day outings around the mountains rather than a reason to go.

Cinque Terre has almost no nightlife: a glass of white on the harbour wall at sunset, a handful of later bars in Monterosso and Riomaggiore, and the train to La Spezia for anything more.

In the French Alps, winter changes the picture. From December to April, Val Thorens, Val d'Isère and Méribel go from dancing on tables at slope-side restaurants to clubs open into the small hours. In summer it comes down to Annecy's terraces and Grenoble's student bars, which is still more than the Ligurian villages offer.

Cinque Terre is a fine walking coast. The Sentiero Azzurro runs between the villages and the Sentiero Rosso follows the ridge above, and you can kayak or dive in the marine reserve. The walks are short and intimate: one village to the next, then the train back.

The Alps work on a different scale. There is Mont Blanc and the Aiguille du Midi, the Tour du Mont Blanc, ibex in the Vanoise and Écrins, and the huge linked ski areas of the Tarentaise. Add paragliding over Lake Annecy, cycling the Galibier and rafting on the Isère, and you have far more to do outdoors.

Both make good bases for excursions, but of different kinds. From Cinque Terre the coastal railway puts Pisa, Lucca, Genoa and the Riviera towns of Portofino and Sestri Levante within reach, and boats cross to Portovenere and Lerici, all without a car.

The Alps rely on their borders. You can reach Geneva, take the Lake Geneva ferries to Lausanne and Lavaux, ride the train to Lyon, or go through the Mont Blanc tunnel to Courmayeur and Aosta. That works well from Annecy or Chamonix, and much less well from the deep Tarentaise valleys.

Cinque Terre is hard going with small children. There are steps everywhere, a pushchair is useless and the summer trains are packed. Monterosso, flat and with a gently shelving beach, is the one easy base, and the coast suits older children who like to walk.

The Alps are set up for families. Ski schools have snow gardens for the youngest, and in car-free resorts such as Avoriaz and Flaine you can walk from the apartment to the slope. In summer there is the train to the Mer de Glace, marmot spotting and the shallow lake beaches at Annecy, though cold mornings, altitude and long transfer days take their toll.

Cinque Terre is the simpler place to move around. One local train links the five villages with La Spezia and Levanto, only minutes apart, and ferries and trails do the rest. A car only gets in the way. The effort is the summer crowds and the climbing.

In the Alps, lifts make a single resort easy, but getting there means a transfer from Geneva, Lyon or Grenoble, with Saturday queues in the Tarentaise and snow chains in winter. In summer the lakes and passes lie in separate valleys, so a car pays off.

Cinque Terre's shops sell pesto, jarred anchovies, lemon liqueur, Sciacchetrà and some ceramics, and little else. The Alps are no shopping destination either, but there is more to find. Chamonix has technical climbing and ski shops, Courchevel 1850 and Megève have luxury boutiques, and Annecy's markets sell Opinel knives and Beaufort, with Geneva just over the border.

Neither is cheap, and the cost comes from different places. In Cinque Terre it is the rooms, which are scarce and in demand in season, plus the charge for using the park paths. Food and the train stay reasonable, and many people save by staying in La Spezia or Levanto.

In the Alps the cost is the winter ski trip, with lift pass, hire, ski school and chalet all adding up, and Courchevel or Megève are among Europe's costliest places to stay. Summer stays, low-season weeks and the ordinary French prices of Grenoble, Chambéry or the Bauges bring it down.

Cinque Terre has next to nothing, beyond bands on feast days and the odd concert in a church. The Alps have more: Grenoble's arts centre and chamber orchestra, chamber music at Évian in summer and open-air festivals in Chamonix. For opera you still travel out from both, to Genoa from the coast and to Lyon or Geneva from the mountains.

In Cinque Terre the only way to relax is the pace: no cars, a terrace above the sea and quiet mornings out of season. There is no spa culture at all.

The Alps have taken the waters since Roman times. Aix-les-Bains and Évian are grand spa towns on the lakes, Saint-Gervais has thermal baths below Mont Blanc, and the upmarket resorts have hotel spas looking out over the snow. For a restful stay they are clearly the better choice, provided you avoid a resort in the busiest weeks of the ski season.