Karlovy Vary or Munich?

Neither city has a coast, and swimming is a sideline in both. In Karlovy Vary it means the warm pools fed by the springs, or a trip out to Lake Medard, a flooded former mine near Sokolov.

Munich does better in summer. Locals sunbathe on the Isar's gravel banks at the Flaucher. The Starnberger See and the Ammersee, under an hour away by S-Bahn, have jetties, lawns and clear, fresh alpine water.

Both kitchens rest on roast pork, dumplings and good beer, so the difference is depth rather than style. Karlovy Vary has its own spa wafers and Becherovka, but it has no proper market, little street food and few ambitious restaurants.

Munich has a whole way of eating built around its breweries, from white sausage before noon to picnics under the chestnut trees of a beer garden. It also has the Viktualienmarkt, a serious coffee-and-cake habit and a tier of starred kitchens.

Karlovy Vary is one very pretty ensemble. Pastel Belle Époque hotels climb the Teplá valley around the colonnades and the Vřídlo geyser, and the spa quarter itself is the UNESCO-listed sight. Its museums of glass and liqueur are small, and a day or two is enough.

Munich has far more to fill a stay. The Pinakotheks and the Glyptothek in the Kunstareal, the Residenz, Nymphenburg and the Deutsches Museum are collections of European rank, even if much of the old town was rebuilt after the war.

Karlovy Vary goes to bed early. Outside the film festival week, a night out means a hotel bar, a casino or a Czech pub. Munich is no party capital, but it has real choice: long evenings in beer halls, cocktail and gay bars around Gärtnerplatz, student pubs in Schwabing, and techno clubs that stay open until morning at weekends.

Both have green country close by, but on very different scales. In Karlovy Vary, beech and spruce woods rise straight out of the spa valley, with gentle paths up to the Diana tower, and Klínovec in the Ore Mountains offers modest skiing.

From Munich, the Alps are about an hour away by train. The Zugspitze, Garmisch and Tegernsee offer proper alpine hiking and skiing. In the city itself, the English Garden and the cycle paths along the Isar give you plenty of space outdoors.

Karlovy Vary has a good short list. Loket's castle is twenty minutes away, the sister spa towns of Mariánské Lázně and Františkovy Lázně are about an hour away, and Plzeň or Prague make a long day out. Munich reaches much further, and more quickly, by rail: Salzburg, Nuremberg, Regensburg, Innsbruck and the royal castles of Neuschwanstein and Herrenchiemsee, with Augsburg barely half an hour away.

Children enjoy Karlovy Vary's geyser, the funicular up to the Diana lookout and the warm wafers, but the town is made for adults taking cures, and the steep valley is tiring with a pushchair. Munich is built for families: a large zoo on the Isar meadows, the Deutsches Museum's children's area, an aquarium in the Olympic Park, beer gardens with playgrounds and public transport that takes pushchairs, with Legoland within reach.

Both centres are walkable, but they are shaped differently. Karlovy Vary is one long strip along the Teplá, level on the promenade and steep above it. Buses and the funicular handle the climbs, and slow regional trains run beyond the town.

Munich's pedestrianised old town is compact and flat. One network of U-Bahn, S-Bahn, trams and buses reaches the museums, palaces, lakes and airport, and cycling suits the riverside routes. Only the spa town's forests and villages really call for a car.

Shopping in Karlovy Vary happens along the promenades, among jewellers, fur shops and spa souvenirs. It is worth it mainly for Moser crystal, local porcelain and Bohemian garnets. Munich has the full range of a wealthy city, from the luxury houses of Maximilianstrasse and the department stores of Kaufingerstrasse to independent boutiques in Glockenbach and specialist tailors selling dirndls and lederhosen.

Karlovy Vary is the cheaper of the two. Its promenade hotels and restaurants charge for the setting, but one street back the pubs and canteens charge local Czech prices, and rooms cost less outside summer.

Munich is Germany's most expensive city. Hotels are dear all year and very dear during the Oktoberfest and the big trade fairs. Picnics in beer gardens, free parks and lakes, and token museum fees on Sundays soften the bill.

Karlovy Vary's symphony orchestra grew out of the old spa bands and plays light classical programmes, sometimes outdoors on the colonnades. The Fellner and Helmer theatre takes touring productions. It makes a pleasant evening rather than a reason to go.

Munich is a destination for this in its own right. The Bavarian State Opera plays at the National Theatre, and the city has three major orchestras, the rococo Cuvilliés Theatre, operetta at the Gärtnerplatztheater and a respected jazz scene.

This is where the spa town leads clearly. In Karlovy Vary, rest is the whole point: thirteen springs sipped from spouted cups, medical stays with carbonated baths and peat wraps, pools of warm spring water, and days that move at a convalescent's pace.

Munich has a real bathing culture too, with the Art Nouveau Müller'sches Volksbad, textile-free saunas and the huge thermal complex at Erding, forty minutes away. There, though, these are outings during a busy city trip rather than the purpose of it.