Lecce or Tirana?

Lecce wins clearly. Both cities sit inland, but Lecce has two coasts within easy reach. There are fine sandy shallows at Porto Cesareo and Punta Prosciutto on the Ionian side, and pale coves and sea stacks at Torre dell'Orso on the Adriatic, so in summer the beach can shape the whole stay.

From Tirana the nearest swim is at Durrës, a long sandy strip lined with hotels and beach clubs where the water near the port is not always clear. Albania's famous southern coves around Ksamil are a separate trip of many hours.

Both kitchens are rooted in farm cooking, and Lecce's is the more rewarding to eat through. It has its own daily rhythm: a warm pasticciotto and iced almond coffee at breakfast, a rustico mid-morning, then ciceri e tria, orecchiette and dark Negroamaro at dinner, all served cheaply in old-town osterie.

Tirana's best meals are slow-baked tavë kosi, fërgesë and grilled meat, with the standout settings in the farm restaurants on the hills outside town. In both cities you eat the local food or not much else, as neither offers broad international range or many ambitious tables.

Lecce is the far richer place for sightseeing. Its old town is a near-complete Baroque townscape carved in soft local limestone, from Santa Croce's crowded facade to the enclosed Piazza del Duomo at dusk, with a Roman amphitheatre half-buried below the main square. The pleasure lies in the streets themselves.

Tirana tells the twentieth century instead. Bunk'Art, the House of Leaves and the Pyramid make for some of the most striking visits in the Balkans, with the Et'hem Bey Mosque and the National History Museum on Skanderbeg Square. The older layers are thin, though, and two days covers the city.

Tirana has the stronger night out, and it is concentrated in one place. Blloku, once sealed off for the communist elite, is a grid of cocktail bars and lounge terraces where a young, well-dressed crowd stays out past midnight, with bigger clubs by the Grand Park lake.

Lecce's evenings are gentler: the passeggiata, an aperitivo on the piazzas, then wine bars in the old lanes, kept going by students at weekends. For dancing in summer you drive to the beach clubs around Gallipoli.

Tirana has the edge because it has mountains. A cable car climbs Mount Dajti from the city's edge to beech and pine forest at about 1,000m, and the Bovilla reservoir gorge and the hiking around Gamti are within an hour or so.

Lecce's surroundings are a flat plain of olive groves, which is good only for easy cycling. Its outdoors is the sea: clifftop paths and sea caves between Otranto and Leuca, snorkelling and diving, and birdwatching at Le Cesine and the Alimini lakes.

Both are natural bases, and Lecce has the slightly richer circuit. Otranto's walled town and cathedral mosaic, island Gallipoli and the frescoes of Galatina are close by, and Ostuni and the trulli of Alberobello are a longer drive north.

Tirana's trips go further back in time than the capital itself: Skanderbeg's castle at Kruja, the Roman amphitheatre at Durrës and, above all, Ottoman Berat, with Shkodra and Apollonia also around two hours away. Slow roads make these full days, and in both regions a car makes life far easier.

Lecce is the easier city with young children. The old town is largely traffic-free, the piazzas fill with families in the evening, and the shallow sand at Porto Cesareo suits toddlers.

Tirana is just as welcoming in its cafés, and the Grand Park playgrounds and the Dajti cable car make good outings. Heavy traffic and broken pavements make pushing a buggy hard work, though. Neither city has a zoo or theme park worth the trip, and both need a midday rest in summer.

Tirana is a little easier to manage. The flat centre puts Skanderbeg Square, Blloku and the market within a twenty-minute walk, and cheap taxis cover the outlying sights such as Bunk'Art and the cable car. Watch the assertive traffic on wide roads, and leave the confusing buses to locals.

Lecce's old town is even more pleasant on foot, with flat, partly pedestrian lanes and the station at its edge. Beyond the walls the slow Salento railways and summer-only beach buses leave most visitors hiring a car.

Neither city is a shopping destination. They differ in what is worth carrying home. In Lecce that means craft: cartapesta saints and nativity figures from old-town workshops, carved limestone and Grottaglie ceramics. Tirana's best browsing is edible, at the Pazari i Ri market's cheese, honey and raki stalls, along with felt hats and filigree silver, while its fashion shopping is chains in malls.

Tirana stretches a budget much further. Meals, coffee, local wine, taxis and museum tickets cost a fraction of Western European prices, and only the smarter Blloku bars feel at all expensive.

Lecce is good value by Italian standards, with cheap pastries, simple trattorias and fairly priced rooms in old palazzi. In August, though, the Salento fills up, rooms and beach loungers become expensive, and the car hire you will probably need adds to the bill. May, June and September are the better-value months there.

Neither city has a deep stage scene, and Lecce has slightly more to offer, mostly in summer. Pizzica, the Salento's hypnotic tambourine dance, fills village festivals and peaks at the Notte della Taranta in Melpignano, alongside a modest opera and theatre season at the Politeama Greco and Paisiello.

Tirana's main draw is the National Theatre of Opera and Ballet on Skanderbeg Square, where tickets are easy to get. Albania's UNESCO-listed iso-polyphonic singing is rarely heard on the capital's stages.

Lecce is the more restful choice. The sulphur springs of Santa Cesarea Terme sit in grottoes and pools on the cliffs above the sea, and old fortified masserie on the plain have been turned into quiet spa retreats.

Tirana's thermal water at Llixha is a plainer, old-fashioned affair, and spas in the city are mostly in hotels. The calm there comes from long hours on café terraces and walks in the Grand Park or on Dajti, away from the traffic noise of the centre.