Geneva or Verona?

Neither city has a coast and both rely on a lake, so the difference is about how easy it is to get in the water. In Geneva the swimming is in the middle of town: you can dive off the jetty at the Bains des Pâquis between museum visits or lie on the lawns at Genève-Plage, though the water stays cold until June.

Swimming from Verona means half an hour out to the southern shore of Lake Garda, where lidos, pebble coves and Sirmione's limestone shelves wait and the water gets a little warmer in high summer. It makes a fine day out, but the busy weekend beaches mean it rarely becomes a daily habit.

Verona has the more distinctive table. Its osterie around Piazza delle Erbe and in Veronetta serve Amarone risotto, bigoli with duck and bollito with pearà, and the great Veneto wines, Valpolicella, Amarone and Soave, are made a short drive away and poured at counters with snacks before dinner.

Geneva cooks in a French style, with lake perch, fondue and its own Chasselas, and it wins on international range and on polished fine dining in Carouge and the Old Town. What it cannot match is Verona's relaxed, fairly priced evening glass, since every meal in Geneva costs a good deal.

Verona is the richer city to explore on foot. Its UNESCO-listed centre packs a Roman amphitheatre, a hillside Roman theatre, the Scaliger tombs and San Zeno's bronze doors into one bend of the Adige, and Castelvecchio adds its art collection in Scarpa's celebrated galleries.

Geneva's sights tell a narrower story: Calvin at St Pierre Cathedral, diplomacy at the Palais des Nations and the Red Cross museum, and CERN as an unusual extra. Each city fills two or three days, but Verona's are the ones that stay with you.

Neither city is made for late nights, but they go out in different ways. Geneva has the rougher-edged options: bars that stay busy late in the Pâquis behind the station and club nights at the alternative cultural centres in Plainpalais and Jonction, all at steep prices. In Verona the evening revolves around the aperitivo, a spritz or a Valpolicella on Piazza delle Erbe, with cheaper student bars in Veronetta and, in summer, the opera crowd filling the streets around midnight.

Geneva is the stronger base for the outdoors. The Salève's cable car and cliffs, the Jura's forest trails and cross-country skiing, sailing on the lake and Chamonix about an hour away put real mountains within a day in summer and winter alike.

The landscape around Verona is gentler: vineyard walks in Valpolicella, the Adige cycle route and the beech woods of the Lessinia, with Monte Baldo and the windsurfing on Garda an hour away. It suits easy walking and cycling more than high peaks, and the Dolomites are too far for a comfortable day.

Both make excellent bases, but Verona's list is hard to beat. Venice, Giotto's chapel in Padua, Palladio's Vicenza and Mantua are all easy train rides, and the Garda lake towns and the cellars of Soave and Valpolicella are closer still.

Geneva answers with lake steamers to Lausanne, Montreux and Chillon, the Lavaux vineyard terraces, and Annecy and Yvoire across the French border, a lovely mix of lake and mountain. Verona simply has more great art cities within an hour or so.

Verona has the bigger draws for children, though they lie outside town. Gardaland, the water parks on Garda's southern shore and the Parco Natura Viva safari zoo are each about half an hour away, best reached by car, and the Arena tends to fire young imaginations.

Geneva has no zoo, aquarium or theme park, and leans on the animal dioramas of its Natural History Museum, the small enclosures at the Bois de la Bâtie and its lakeside playgrounds, which fill two or three days. Both centres are flat and easy with a pushchair, though Verona's summer afternoons can be very hot for small children.

Both centres are walkable, but Geneva adds a public network that covers almost everything: punctual trams and buses, the yellow harbour boats as part of the same system, and a train to the airport in minutes. Even the mountains are largely reachable without a car.

Verona is a walking city and little more, with no metro or tram and buses used mainly for the station and the airport. Its rail links to Venice, Milan and the lake are excellent, but the Valpolicella villages, the Lessinia and some Garda attractions are far easier with a car.

Geneva is a genuine shopping destination for watches and jewellery, with the flagship boutiques of the Swiss houses along the Rue du Rhône, plus Carouge's craft workshops and the Plainpalais flea market for something less polished. Verona's Via Mazzini is smart but provincial, the best things to take home are Amarone, Garda olive oil and pandoro, and serious fashion shoppers go on to Milan.

This is where the two differ most. Geneva is among the most expensive cities anywhere, where even a simple meal or a glass of wine adds up, although free museums, free transport for hotel guests and staying across the French border take some of the sting out.

Verona is not cheap for its size, and central hotels get dear on opera nights, but eating in Veronetta's osterie and at wine counters is fair and walking costs nothing. A week here costs a good deal less than one in Geneva.

Verona has the one experience people travel for: summer opera in the Roman Arena, with grand productions of Verdi and Puccini under the night sky on the ancient stone tiers. Outside the festival its programme thins to the Teatro Filarmonico season and the summer Shakespeare and jazz nights in the Roman theatre.

Geneva is the steadier choice across the year, with opera and ballet at the Grand Théâtre, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in Victoria Hall and French-language theatre, though none of it matches the spectacle of the Arena.

Geneva has the more distinctive bathing habit within the city itself: in winter the Bains des Pâquis becomes a sauna and hammam, with plunges into the cold lake, the lakefront hotels have serious spas and Évian is across the border. Verona's thermal waters are all out of town, at Sirmione's lakeside spa, the spring-fed park near Lazise and Caldiero, so a soak means a trip out. Both cities are calm, Geneva quiet and orderly on its promenades, Verona slowed down by long lunches and the riverside passeggiata.