Frankfurt or Haarlem?

Frankfurt has no coast at all. A summer swim means an outdoor pool or a gravel-pit lake such as the Langener Waldsee in the southern forest.

Haarlem is far better placed. Zandvoort's long beach and the dune-backed sand at Bloemendaal aan Zee are within a short train or bike ride. The North Sea stays cool and windy, though, so expect beach walks and quick dips rather than long swims.

Frankfurt has the deeper table. Its apple-wine taverns serve Grüne Soße and Handkäs at shared benches, and the Kleinmarkthalle is a proper market hall. Turkish, Italian and Asian kitchens add the range of an international city.

Haarlem eats well but simply, with terrace cafés, herring and kibbeling from the Saturday market, and strong craft beer. Its upper end of dining is thin.

The two are evenly matched, but in different ways. Frankfurt is a museum city. The Städel and the long row of institutions on the Museumsufer are the draw, set around a rebuilt Römer and a skyline of towers.

Haarlem's strength is its intact historic fabric: canals, hidden hofjes, St Bavo and its famous organ. It also has two distinctive museums in the Frans Hals and the eighteenth-century Teylers.

Frankfurt clearly goes later and harder. It carries on the techno and house tradition it shares with Offenbach, the Bahnhofsviertel has rough-edged cocktail bars, and the riverbanks fill on summer nights. Its weekends are much busier than its weeknights.

Haarlem's evenings revolve around brown cafés and terraces on the Grote Markt and Botermarkt, sociable but finished well before dawn. For clubs, people take the train to Amsterdam.

Frankfurt's outdoors is wooded hills. The Taunus begins past the northern suburbs, with beech forest, Roman frontier trails and the Großer Feldberg at about 880m, all under an hour away by S-Bahn and bus. The Stadtwald and the cycle paths along the Main are inside the city, and the Rheingau vineyards lie further out.\n\nHaarlem has dunes and sea instead. The pine woods, small lakes and grazing ponies of Zuid-Kennemerland begin at the western edge of town, the coast is good for long beach walks, and spring brings cycling through the bulb fields. There is nothing to climb, and the wind is often strong.

Both are superb bases, with different scenery to reach. Frankfurt's high-speed rail brings Heidelberg, the castle-lined Rhine Gorge, Cologne and Würzburg within about an hour or so.

Haarlem's dense Dutch network puts Amsterdam, Leiden, The Hague and Delft close at hand, plus cheese markets, windmills and the Keukenhof in spring. The Dutch towns are closer to one another, while Frankfurt's trips reach further and take in more variety.

Frankfurt has more that is built for children. The Senckenberg's dinosaur hall, a central zoo, the Palmengarten glasshouses and parks out in the Taunus fill several days.

Haarlem is easy and relaxed with children, with a car-free centre, bikes everywhere and the dunes to run in. But it has no zoo or theme park, so families often head to Amsterdam for those.

Frankfurt runs on rails. U-Bahn, S-Bahn, trams and buses share one network that stretches to the Taunus, Wiesbaden and Mainz, and the airport is about a quarter of an hour from the centre by train. The zones take a day to learn, though the core from the Römer to the Museumsufer is easy to walk.\n\nIn Haarlem the bike does most of the work. The flat centre takes about twenty minutes to cross on foot, the station sits at its northern edge, and separate bike paths lead out into the dunes. For longer trips, one contactless card covers the trains.

Frankfurt has the big names. The Zeil is lined with department stores and malls, and Goethestraße, just west of it, holds the luxury fashion and jewellery houses. For independent shops you head out to Berger Straße or Schweizer Straße.\n\nIn Haarlem it is the other way round, and the independents fill the centre. Gierstraat, Kleine Houtstraat and Schagchelstraat are full of boutiques, design shops and bookshops, and on market days the Grote Markt fills with flowers and cheese. It suits an afternoon of browsing better than a big shopping trip.

Neither is cheap, but Frankfurt gives a little more room to manage costs. Its hotels are priced for business travellers and soar during trade fairs, yet they ease noticeably at weekends and in summer. Taverns and Turkish grills keep meals modest.

Haarlem has too few rooms for the visitors who want to stay there, especially in tulip season. Rooms run small for the price, and regular train trips add up.

This is one of Frankfurt's clearest advantages. Its opera company is among Germany's most respected, the Alte Oper hosts symphony concerts, and drama, contemporary dance and cellar jazz round out a full season from autumn to early summer.

Haarlem offers a solid small-city programme at the Philharmonie and Stadsschouwburg. Its real speciality is organ music at St Bavo. For opera, visitors go to Amsterdam.

Frankfurt itself is busy, but the spa towns around it are not. Wiesbaden's hot-spring Kaiser-Friedrich-Therme, Bad Homburg's thermal complex and Bad Nauheim all carry on the old German tradition of taking the waters.

Haarlem has no springs or historic baths. It relaxes you through its quiet canals, terrace lingering and dune walks, with Dutch sauna complexes further out in the region.