Dublin or London?

Neither city works for a beach vacation, but the coast plays a different part in each. Dublin has its own sandy strands at Dollymount, Sandymount and Killiney, reached by the DART, and a real habit of cold sea swimming at the Forty Foot and Seapoint.

London has no shoreline at all. The nearest is Brighton's pebble beach, an hour away by train, or the sandier Kent coast at Margate and Whitstable, and its swimmers go to lidos and the Hampstead Heath ponds instead.

London eats far better. Its range comes from its communities, with Bangladeshi cooking on Brick Lane, Turkish grills on Green Lanes, Punjabi food in Southall and Caribbean kitchens south of the river, along with a deep fine-dining scene and Borough Market.

Dublin's meals rest on excellent Irish produce, Atlantic shellfish, lamb and farmhouse cheese, cooked well in a handful of modern bistros, but the choice is narrower. Its real pleasure is in the glass: a slow pint of stout and the whiskey distilleries are what visitors tend to remember.

London is in another league for sights. The British Museum, the V&A, the National Gallery and Tate Modern are each a day in themselves, and the landmarks run from the Tower and Westminster Abbey to St Paul's and Greenwich, enough to fill a week and more.

Dublin offers a compact, rewarding few days instead: the Book of Kells at Trinity, the Chester Beatty Library, Kilmainham Gaol and the Georgian terraces around Merrion Square, all within walking distance. It has the literary heritage of Joyce and Wilde but few grand monuments.

Dublin's night out is the pub, done very well, with snugs and coal fires off Grafton Street and younger late bars on Camden and Wexford Streets. Clubs are few, and licensing hours bring most nights to a close not long after the pubs.

London goes much further. Soho stays busy late, Shoreditch, Hackney and Dalston carry the warehouse and club scene, and Brixton and Peckham add big venues, so a weekend can run until morning in a way Dublin rarely does.

Dublin has the wilder setting. Phoenix Park and North Bull Island start the green inside the city, the Howth cliff path and the Bray to Greystones walk are a short train ride away, and the granite Wicklow Mountains, with Glendalough about an hour off, rise straight from the southern suburbs.

London's green is more parkland than landscape: Richmond Park's deer and oaks, Hampstead Heath and Kew. For proper walking you take a train an hour out to the Chilterns or the South Downs, which are pleasant but gentle.

London's rail network gives it the wider choice. Oxford, Cambridge and Windsor are about an hour away, Bath and Stonehenge make longer days, and Canterbury, Brighton and Portsmouth add quite different outings, all without a car.

Dublin's best excursions are outstanding in their own right, above all Newgrange in the Boyne Valley and the monastic site at Glendalough, with Kilkenny and Belfast by train. Many of the rural sites, though, are much easier with a tour or a hire car.

Dublin is smaller and simpler to manage with children. Dublin Zoo sits inside Phoenix Park, with room to run and deer to spot, Dublinia brings the Vikings to life, and pubs welcome families over lunch. It runs out of things to do sooner, though, and the rain means keeping indoor plans ready.

London gives children far more to do. The Natural History Museum's dinosaurs, the Science Museum, the Young V&A and the pirate ship playground in Kensington Gardens are all free, and Legoland and the Harry Potter studios are within reach. The catch is size: long distances, crowds when schools are out, and Tube stairs that are hard with a buggy.

London is easier to cover as a whole. The Underground, Elizabeth line, buses and Thames riverboats reach almost everywhere on one contactless card, though the city's size means long journeys and packed rush-hour trains.

Dublin's flat centre is quicker to walk, and the DART and two Luas lines serve the bay and cross town well. Without a metro, the airport and much of the city rely on slow buses, and reaching the Boyne or Wicklow calls for a car or tour.

London is one of the world's great shopping cities and Dublin is a modest one. London has luxury on Bond Street and Sloane Street, landmark department stores such as Liberty, Selfridges and Fortnum & Mason, and Savile Row tailoring. Its independents and markets run from Seven Dials to Portobello Road and Camden.

Dublin centres on Grafton Street, Brown Thomas and the Powerscourt Townhouse arcade, with little luxury and few markets. Its strength is Irish craft: Aran knitwear, linen, tweed and whiskey from the design shops around Drury Street.

Both are costly, and neither offers much relief on rooms, which are among Europe's priciest in each city. The savings come from different places. Dublin's small centre means you can walk almost everywhere, and its national museums are free.

London's free collections and parks go much further, the contactless daily cap helps if you ride a lot, and markets and South Asian or Turkish cafés make cheaper meals easy to find, though its size makes staying further out more of a trade-off.

London is among the world's great stages. The West End, the National Theatre, the Globe and the Royal Court cover drama, the Royal Opera House and the Coliseum handle opera and ballet, and five major orchestras, the Wigmore Hall and the Proms make classical music just as strong.

Dublin's theatre is excellent for its size, led by the Abbey and the Gate, and its traditional sessions in pubs are a nightly pleasure London cannot offer in the same way. It has no permanent opera house, though, and the choice on any given night is far smaller.

Neither is a place to unwind, but London has more to offer. Victorian Turkish baths survive at Ironmonger Row and in Bayswater, the grand hotels of Mayfair have full spas, and the thermal waters of Bath are a day trip away.

Dublin's one real ritual is a cold dip at the Forty Foot or Seapoint followed by a seafront sauna. Otherwise, calm means a walk in Phoenix Park or an afternoon in the villages along the bay.