Genoa or Zurich?

Genoa has the actual sea. In town there are the pebble cove at Boccadasse, the bathing establishments on the rocks of Corso Italia and the swimming platforms at Nervi. A short train ride brings Camogli, Sestri Levante or the sandier beaches of Varazze. The water is warmer than Zurich's and the season lasts into September.

Zurich swims in fresh water instead, from the wooden bathing houses at Utoquai and Mythenquai or by drifting down the Limmat at Letten. It is clean and sociable, but you lie on grass and decks, not a shore, and the summer is short. Neither city is a true beach destination.

Genoa eats better and far more locally. There is pesto with trofie, pansoti in walnut sauce and focaccia at breakfast. The old-town friggitorie sell farinata and fried fish by the slice, and the Mercato Orientale shows where it all comes from. Street food and seafood are its strengths.

Zurich offers veal in cream sauce with rösti, winter fondue in the guild houses and outstanding chocolate. Kreis 4 and 5 add a more international range, and the fine-dining tier is deeper than Genoa's. What it lacks is markets and casual eating on Genoa's scale, and every meal is expensive.

Genoa has the richer historic fabric. Its medieval quarter is one of the largest in Europe, and the UNESCO-listed Rolli palaces on Via Garibaldi have painted halls. Add San Lorenzo and the marble sculpture of Staglieno, and the city takes longer to see than most visitors expect.

Zurich's offer is tidier and smaller: the Kunsthaus, the Swiss National Museum, Chagall's windows in the Fraumünster and the Grossmünster, where the Swiss Reformation began. As a picture gallery the Kunsthaus holds its own, but the compact Altstadt is covered in two or three days.

Genoa does a long aperitivo well, but for a night that lasts until morning Zurich is well ahead. A Genoese evening is spent drinking in the old-town squares and lanes near the university, where the crowd is mostly students and locals, with a few terraces by the water at the Porto Antico and Foce. Weekends stay lively late in the caruggi, but there are only a handful of clubs, the city is older and more reserved than most of Italy, and midweek it goes to bed early.

Zurich has a real electronic music culture. Its clubs sit in the old industrial districts of Kreis 4, Kreis 5 and Zurich West and run until daylight, while Langstrasse, rough and open late, holds the scene together. Each August the Street Parade turns the lake shore into a huge techno gathering. In summer both cities drink outdoors, Genoa along the seafront at Corso Italia and Zurich in the bars of its lake bathing houses and on the Limmat banks, though in Zurich the cost of each round tends to end the night sooner.

Both have superb landscapes on the doorstep, but of opposite kinds. Genoa's is coast and steep hills: the ring of fortresses above Righi, the cliff paths of the Portofino promontory down to San Fruttuoso and the Cinque Terre trails. Boats also take you out to see whales and dolphins in the Pelagos Sanctuary.

Zurich's is lake and mountain. The Uetliberg and the Albis ridge start at the city's edge, and Rigi, Pilatus and the Glarus valleys are about an hour away for high-mountain hiking. In winter there is skiing at Flumserberg. Genoa is the place for coastal walks in spring and autumn, while Zurich adds the high Alps and snow.

Both sit on excellent rail lines, and the difference is what lies along them. From Genoa the trips are mostly coastal: Portofino, Camogli and the Cinque Terre to the east, and Finale Ligure Borgo and Noli to the west. Milan and Turin are about an hour and a half inland.

From Zurich the trains fan out across a whole country. Lucerne is under an hour away, Bern, Basel and St Gallen about an hour each, and the Rhine Falls and Stein am Rhein lie to the north. From Genoa you go out for swims and fishing villages, and from Zurich for lakes, old towns and abbeys, with smoother connections.

Zurich is the easier city with children. It is clean and orderly and its transport copes with buggies. The zoo has a Madagascar rainforest hall, the lake lidos are shallow and the Technorama is twenty minutes away. Quiet evenings suit younger children.

Genoa has one excellent family day at the Porto Antico, with its large aquarium, the walk-through submarine at the Galata museum and funiculars to ride, plus warmer sea swimming. Away from the harbour, though, the steep, dark lanes and stairs are hard with a pushchair, and there are few parks beyond Nervi.

Zurich is about as easy to move around as a city gets. Trams reach every district, and the S-Bahn, the funiculars and even the lake boats all run on one punctual ticket. The airport is a short train ride from the main station.

Genoa works on foot in the old town and Porto Antico, but the caruggi are a maze and the city climbs sharply from the water. Funiculars and public lifts help with the hills and the coastal railway is excellent for the Riviera, while buses crawl through congested streets.

Zurich is the shopping city of the two. Bahnhofstrasse has watchmakers, jewellers and long-established department stores, the railway arches of Zurich West hold design shops and the Niederdorf has boutiques. Watches and chocolate are what people take home, and everything costs Swiss prices.

Genoa's main streets, Via XX Settembre and Via Roma, carry the familiar Italian labels without much luxury. Its better buys are in the old town: pesto, olive oil, candied fruit, silver filigree and coral.

Here the gap is huge. Genoa is mid-range for northern Italy. Focaccia and farinata make almost free meals, trattoria lunches are fair and central hotels cost less than in Italy's most visited cities. Only the Riviera resorts and lounger hire push costs up in summer.

Zurich is one of the most expensive cities in the world to visit, from hotel rooms to a casual lunch to a single drink. Supermarket picnics, the free lidos and the visitor card help, but the same days cost far more than in Genoa.

Zurich takes the stage more seriously. The Opernhaus is one of Europe's most respected opera houses, the Tonhalle Orchestra plays in a restored nineteenth-century hall, and the Schauspielhaus is one of the leading theatres of the German-speaking world. The Rote Fabrik and the clubs of Kreis 4 and 5 add jazz, indie and electronic acts, and in summer the Theater Spektakel comes to the lake shore.

Genoa has the Carlo Felice for opera, ballet and symphony concerts, regular concerts in Paganini's honour, and small clubs that keep its singer-songwriter tradition alive. That is enough for an evening or two, but not a reason to go.

Zurich is the more restful choice. Its bath in the vaults of the old Hürlimann brewery has thermal pools and a rooftop pool. In winter the wooden lake and river baths become saunas with cold dips between rounds, and Baden's hot springs, used since Roman times, are twenty minutes away.

Genoa has no bathing culture of its own, and the nearest thermal water is at Acqui Terme, over an hour away. Its calm is found on the promenade and in the villa gardens at Nervi, or over long lunches in the Riviera villages. The centre stays noisy.