Cologne or Ghent?

Neither city is right for a swimming vacation, but Ghent has the better option because the sea is close enough for a day out. Ostend is about an hour away by train, and the coast tram links wide sandy beaches and dunes. The North Sea is cold and often windy, though. On hot afternoons in town, the Blaarmeersen lake has a sandy shore and supervised swimming.

Cologne has no coast within a day's reach, and the Rhine is unsafe for swimming. What it has is gravel-pit lakes such as Fühlinger See and Otto-Maigler-See, with grassy banks and warmer water than the North Sea. They are fine for a lazy summer afternoon, but that is all.

Ghent is the more rewarding place to eat and drink. The brown cafés around the Vrijdagmarkt serve long lists of Trappist, lambic and abbey beers. The Patershol lanes hold the better restaurants, serving waterzooi, beef stewed in beer and grey shrimp croquettes. Vegetarians are unusually well looked after.

Cologne's food is more one-note. It revolves around the Brauhaus, with hearty plates like Himmel un Ääd alongside the Köbes and the endless small glasses of Kölsch. That ritual is great fun, and Ehrenfeld's Venloer Strasse adds good Turkish food, but beyond that the range is narrower.

The two are broadly level for sightseeing, but in different ways. Ghent's strength is the whole townscape. The guildhalls of the Graslei and Korenlei, the moated Gravensteen and the three towers seen from St Michael's Bridge make up a medieval centre that is still lived in. At its heart is the van Eyck altarpiece in St Bavo's.

Cologne offers standout buildings and collections in a plain postwar city. The cathedral alone is worth the trip, and the ring of twelve Romanesque churches and the Roman remains add depth. For modern art Cologne goes further, with Museum Ludwig's Pop Art, while Ghent leans towards the Flemish masters.

Cologne offers the fuller night out. A typical evening starts in the Altstadt brewhouses and moves on to cocktail bars in the Belgian Quarter, the student strip on Zülpicher Strasse or the clubs in Ehrenfeld's old factories. It also has one of Germany's biggest gay scenes around Rudolfplatz. Carnival, in the days before Lent, turns the whole city into a costumed party.

Ghent's nights are good for its size but narrower. Evenings mean long sessions over strong beer in the old cafés, or the loud student bars of the Overpoort in term time, and there are only a few small clubs. Its big moment comes in summer, when the Gentse Feesten fills the centre for ten days every July.

Cologne has much better countryside within reach. In under an hour you can be on the trails of the Siebengebirge below the Drachenfels, in the reservoir valleys of the Bergisches Land or among the Eifel's crater lakes and Ahr vineyards. Closer in, the Grüngürtel parks and Rhine cycle paths cover easier days.

Ghent is surrounded by flat farmland. The outdoors there means riding the Leie paths to Sint-Martens-Latem, birdwatching in the Bourgoyen-Ossemeersen wetland or heading out to the Zwin reserve on the coast. It is pleasant, but there are no hills to climb.

Both are excellent bases, but Ghent has the richer set of trips on its doorstep. Bruges is under half an hour away and Brussels about the same, Antwerp is under an hour, and Mechelen, Leuven and Lille are all close. Most of these are medieval art cities. Ypres and the First World War battlefields add a sombre, very different day.

Cologne's day trips are more varied in kind but more spread out. Brühl's rococo palaces, Bonn and Aachen's Carolingian chapel are all quick by train. The castles and wine towns of the Rhine Gorge take longer, and Brussels is nearly two hours away.

Cologne is clearly better with children. There is a long-established zoo with an elephant park, a chocolate fountain at the riverside Chocolate Museum, the cable car to the Rheinpark playgrounds, and one of Europe's big theme parks just south at Brühl. The one time to avoid with small children is Carnival.

Ghent is safe and easy, since cars are kept out of the centre. Children usually love the Gravensteen's battlements, the canal boats and the old toys at the House of Alijn. After that the options thin out, because the zoo is in Antwerp, and the cobbles make pushchairs hard work.

Both cities are easy to get around without a car, but they work differently. Ghent is mostly done on foot or by bike, as its car-free medieval core takes minutes to cross. The catch is that the main station is a twenty-minute walk south, so a tram ride is part of arriving.

In Cologne you step off the train beside the cathedral, right in the old town. However, reaching Ehrenfeld, the Belgian Quarter or the zoo means using the Stadtbahn, whose map is confusing and whose trams can be crowded.

Cologne has slightly more to offer shoppers, mainly in volume. Schildergasse and Hohe Strasse are among Germany's busiest high streets, and Ehrenstrasse and the Belgian Quarter add independent fashion. Eau de Cologne from the old perfume houses on Glockengasse makes a classic souvenir, and the Advent Christmas markets are a draw.

Ghent is better for browsing. The best of it is the weekend flea market at Sint-Jacobs, the Sunday flower market on the Kouter and the design shops of the Serpentstraat, and the things worth taking home are edible, like cuberdons, mustard and beer.

Cologne is the somewhat cheaper stay. A brewhouse dinner with a few Kölsch costs less than a sit-down meal with Belgian beers in Ghent, where restaurant bills add up quickly. In both cities the main churches are free to enter.

Your dates matter more than the city. Cologne's hotel rates jump during the big Messe trade fairs and at Carnival. Ghent's rooms fill and get pricier during the Gentse Feesten in July, but they are reasonably priced the rest of the year.

Cologne has the bigger stage life. The Philharmonie beside the cathedral is home to two major orchestras, and the WDR broadcaster adds a big band and choirs. There are also the opera and theatre, a long electronic and jazz tradition, and a large arena for touring acts. The Carnival sessions, with their dialect songs, are found nowhere else.

Ghent is strong for a mid-sized city. It has the opera house shared with the Flemish national company, and De Bijloke's concerts in a medieval hospital. NTGent's productions are well known, though mostly performed in Dutch. Early-music lovers are well served in both cities, in Cologne's Romanesque churches and at De Bijloke.

For actual spa time Cologne is far ahead. Germany's sauna culture is part of local weekend life there, the mineral-spring thermal bath in the Rheinpark looks across to the cathedral, and Aachen's hot springs are close by. The city itself is busy, though, and Carnival is anything but restful.

Ghent has no bathing culture, only a few hotel spas. What it offers instead is calm: the enclosed beguinage gardens, slow walks along the Coupure canal and quiet Sundays. It suits unwinding after sightseeing rather than a wellness trip.