Genoa or Portofino?

Neither place is a beach destination, and for swimming they are about level. What differs is the kind of swimming. Genoa offers city swimming: the pebble cove at Boccadasse, the bathing establishments built over the rocks on Corso Italia and the platforms below Nervi's promenade. The train also takes you to longer, sandier stretches from Varazze to Sestri Levante.

In Portofino you swim from rock ladders on the way to the lighthouse, into deep, very clear water. Paraggi is the only nearby sand, and most of it belongs to paid beach clubs. San Fruttuoso's pebble beach, which you reach on foot or by boat, makes the more memorable swim.

Both serve the same Ligurian cooking, but Genoa does it far better. It has oily breakfast focaccia, chickpea farinata and panissa from old friggitorie, pesto in its home city, and the Mercato Orientale for seeing the region's produce. Eating well there is easy and cheap.

In Portofino, food means a few harbourside terraces where you pay mainly for the view of the yachts, and the cooking is usually competent rather than memorable. There is no market and no street food, which is why people who care about eating drive or take the bus to Santa Margherita or Camogli.

The difference is very large. Genoa has one of Europe's largest medieval quarters and the Rolli palaces on Via Garibaldi, where Palazzo Rosso and Palazzo Bianco hold Van Dyck and Rubens. It also has San Lorenzo cathedral, the Palazzo Ducale and Staglieno's marble cemetery, enough for several full days.

Portofino's culture is mostly its looks: the horseshoe of ochre houses, San Giorgio church and Castello Brown above the harbour, and the abbey of San Fruttuoso around the point. It has no museums of any size, and a day covers it all.

Genoa is quiet for an Italian city, but it still has evenings: students and locals drinking aperitivo around Piazza delle Erbe, waterfront bars at the Porto Antico, and beach clubs along Corso Italia in summer. Portofino has a smart aperitivo facing the yachts, dinner, and then very little, with no clubs and early nights outside July and August. Anyone wanting a proper night out there ends up in Rapallo or Genoa.

Both are excellent for the outdoors, and the overlap is real, because Genoa's best coastal walking is on the Portofino promontory itself. From Genoa you also get the funicular to Righi and the ridge trail linking the old forts, the quieter Apennines and Beigua Geopark inland, and whale-watching boats into the Pelagos Sanctuary.

Portofino puts you on the trails from your door, climbing to Monte di Portofino and dropping past chained, exposed sections to San Fruttuoso. Its marine reserve, with red coral walls and the Christ of the Abyss statue, makes it the better base for diving.

Genoa has the edge because it sits at the hub of the rail network. Portofino and the Riviera towns are under an hour east, the quieter western coast at Finale Ligure Borgo and Noli lies the other way, and Milan and Turin are close enough for a museum day.

Portofino covers the eastern Riviera well, including a day in Genoa, and in summer it has the more enjoyable way to travel: ferries from the harbour to the Cinque Terre and Portovenere. Outside the ferry season, though, every trip starts with the bus to Santa Margherita station.

Genoa is much the better choice with children, mainly because of the Porto Antico. The aquarium, the children's science centre, the biosphere and the Galata museum's walk-through submarine can fill a couple of days, and the funiculars and public lifts are fun rides in themselves. The steep, dark old-town lanes are hard work with a pushchair.

Portofino is safe and calm, and children like the boats and swimming off the rocks. But there are no playgrounds, the steps rule out pushchairs and the little sand there is costs money. Families usually stay in Santa Margherita and come into Genoa for the aquarium.

Genoa is steep and its lanes are a maze, but funiculars, public lifts and a short metro line help you up and across it, and the coastal railway reaches Nervi and the Riviera without a car. Portofino is simple to walk once you are there. Getting in and out is the problem: one narrow road with almost no parking, a bus that is crowded in summer, and ferries that run only from spring to autumn.

Neither is a shopping destination, and they offer different things. Genoa has the wider range: the arcades of Via XX Settembre, Italian labels on Via Roma, old-town shops selling candied fruit and pesto, and workshops making silver filigree and coral.

Portofino has only a few lanes, but they hold a surprising number of fashion and jewellery boutiques, plus resort wear for people coming off the yachts. You can see it all in under an hour, and there are no markets or everyday shops.

The gap is very wide. Genoa feels like good value for northern Italy, with very cheap street food, fair trattoria lunches, affordable central hotels and inexpensive funiculars. Portofino is one of the most expensive places to stay in Italy. Its few hotels are mostly luxury properties, and the piazzetta restaurants, the loungers at Paraggi and the parking all cost a lot. Many visitors sleep in Camogli or Santa Margherita and come over for the day, or simply visit from Genoa.

Genoa is the only real option here. The Teatro Carlo Felice on Piazza De Ferrari runs a season of opera, ballet and symphony concerts, the city puts on concerts in Paganini's honour, and small clubs keep alive the singer-songwriter tradition it gave Italy. Portofino has no theatre or regular venue, just occasional summer concerts in the piazzetta or at the castle, so for opera or theatre you would make the trip to Genoa.

Neither has a bathing tradition, but Portofino is the more restful of the two. Its hillside hotels have spas and pools, the shaded paths are quiet at dawn and dusk, and the months either side of summer are calm. In high summer, though, the tour boats crowd the harbour at midday.

Genoa's peace is limited to Nervi's seafront promenade and villa gardens. For thermal waters you go to Acqui Terme, a little over an hour away.