Frankfurt or Ghent?

Neither city is a place for a beach vacation, but Ghent at least has the coast within reach. Ostend is about an hour away by train, and the coast tram links wide sandy resorts backed by dunes, although the North Sea is cool and often windy.

Frankfurt is a full day's travel from any sea. In summer, swimming means outdoor pools or forest lakes such as the Langener Waldsee, much as Ghent's own families use the lake at the Blaarmeersen.

Both cities serve hearty regional cooking, but Ghent offers more to explore. Alongside waterzooi, beef stewed in dark beer and shrimp croquettes, it has one of the best beer cultures anywhere, poured in brown cafés around the Vrijdagmarkt, and it caters unusually well for vegetarians.

Frankfurt's local food is a smaller repertoire best tried in Sachsenhausen's apple-wine taverns: tart Apfelwein, Grüne Soße and Handkäs at shared tables. The Kleinmarkthalle and the cheap international kitchens of the Bahnhofsviertel make up for some of that.

Ghent has the stronger historic fabric. The Graslei guildhalls, the moated Gravensteen and the line of towers seen from St Michael's Bridge are medieval survivors rather than reconstructions, and the Ghent Altarpiece is a work people cross Europe to see.

Frankfurt lost most of its old centre in 1944, so the Römer and the old-town lanes are rebuilt. Its strength is range: the Museumsufer gathers more than a dozen museums led by the Städel, and the banking towers above them give it a skyline unlike any other in Germany.

The two are fairly even, but the evenings feel different. Frankfurt, together with Offenbach, has a real place in techno and house history, and a small club scene keeps it going at weekends, with the Bahnhofsviertel's cocktail bars and late kiosks as the grittier alternative. Weeknights are quiet.

Ghent is driven by its students rather than by clubs. The Overpoort's bars run loud in term time, while the old cafés around Oudburg suit slower nights over strong beer. In July the Gentse Feesten takes over the whole centre for ten days.

Frankfurt has much more to offer outdoors. The Taunus rises just north of the city, with forest trails and mountain-bike routes up to the Großer Feldberg at about 880m, and the Stadtwald and the Main cycle paths sit within the city itself.

Ghent's surroundings are flat farmland, polders and canals. They make good cycling along the Leie towards Sint-Martens-Latem, and the Bourgoyen-Ossemeersen wetland is good for birdwatching, but there are no hills to climb.

Frankfurt's day trips use high-speed trains to cover real distance, so the outings vary more in kind: Heidelberg's castle ruin and university town, boats between the wine villages of the Rhine Gorge, Cologne Cathedral in about an hour and Würzburg's baroque Residenz a little further. Closer in are Mainz with the Gutenberg Museum, Darmstadt's Art Nouveau artists' colony and the imperial cathedrals of Speyer and Worms.

Ghent's trips are short hops between old cities packed close together. Bruges is under half an hour away, Brussels about half an hour and Antwerp under an hour, with Mechelen and Leuven close behind. The First World War battlefields around Ypres and Lille across the French border add some variety, and the short rides make Ghent a calm base for seeing Flanders.

Frankfurt has more that is made for children. There are dinosaur skeletons at the Senckenberg, a central zoo, the Palmengarten's glasshouses, and a wildlife park and fairy-tale amusement park in the Taunus, and trams take pushchairs easily.

Ghent is safe and calm thanks to its largely car-free centre, and the Gravensteen and the House of Alijn's old toys appeal to children. Beyond those, families have to travel to Antwerp or the coast for a zoo or theme park, and cobbles make pushchairs hard work.

In both cities the sights are a short walk apart, so the difference is in what you use for everything else. Frankfurt relies on rail: U-Bahn, S-Bahn and trams on one regional network that reaches Wiesbaden and the Taunus, and an airport about a quarter of an hour from the centre, though the zones take some learning.

Ghent is a cycling city, with bike streets throughout and rental bikes easy to find, and trams fill the gaps. The main station is a twenty-minute walk from the old centre.

Frankfurt is slightly ahead for shopping, mainly on scale. The Zeil has department stores and large malls, and Goethestraße has the luxury fashion and jewellery houses that Ghent largely lacks.

Ghent's appeal is smaller and more personal: independent design on the Serpentstraat, vintage near the university, a Sunday flower market on the Kouter, and edible souvenirs such as cuberdons, mustard and beer. Both cities have independent streets, Berger Straße in Frankfurt and the Onderbergen in Ghent.

Both are on the expensive side, for different reasons. In Frankfurt the cost is the hotels, which are priced for business travellers and very hard to get during the big trade fairs. Weekends and summer are easier, and taverns and Turkish grills keep meals cheap.

Ghent's hotels are moderate for most of the year apart from festival time in July. What adds up there is sit-down dinners and rounds of Belgian beer, while free churches such as St Bavo's help keep sightseeing costs down.

Frankfurt has the bigger stage. Its opera company is among the most respected in Germany, the Alte Oper hosts the radio symphony orchestra and touring ensembles, and there are jazz cellars and an English-language theatre for those without German.

Ghent does a lot for its size: it shares the Flemish national opera, NTGent is known for bold political theatre, and De Bijloke is the place for early music, though most drama is in Dutch. In summer, when Frankfurt's season winds down, the free stages of the Gentse Feesten keep Ghent lively.

Frankfurt wins here because of the spa towns around it. You can bathe in hot springs at Wiesbaden's Art Nouveau Kaiser-Friedrich-Therme, use the saunas at Bad Homburg's thermal complex, or take the waters at Bad Nauheim, all within easy reach.

Ghent has no bathing culture beyond hotel spas. Its calm is of a quieter kind: enclosed beguinage gardens, walks along the Coupure canal and slow Sundays once the day-trippers have left.