Lefkada or Puglia?

Both are serious beach destinations, but the swimming feels different. Lefkada's famous west coast, at Porto Katsiki, Egremni and Kathisma, lies under tall white cliffs and faces the open Ionian. The shore shelves steeply, afternoons bring waves, and some coves mean long staircases. Calm water is found in the small east-coast bays around Nikiana and Ligia.

Puglia has the gentler sand. The Ionian shore of the Salento, past Gallipoli to Pescoluse, has long, shallow, pale beaches, while the Adriatic side has rock platforms at Polignano a Mare and sea stacks at Torre dell'Orso. Expect rows of paid lidos on the popular sands in August.

Puglia is far the better place to eat. Orecchiette with turnip tops, burrata from around Andria, focaccia barese and sea urchins on the Bari waterfront are everyday food, and Primitivo and Negroamaro go with them. In the Valle d'Itria you can choose meat at a butcher's counter and have it grilled for you.

Lefkada eats well but plainly: grilled fish on the harbour at Nidri, Eglouvi lentils and slow-cooked meat in the hill villages around Karya. The resort strips fall back on tourist menus.

Sightseeing in Lefkada means short breaks from the beach: the fortress of Santa Maura at the causeway, a small archaeological museum, the Faneromeni monastery and the cliff of Sappho's leap at Cape Lefkatas.

Puglia has enough to fill a trip on its own. Lecce is a whole town of carved baroque, Alberobello's trulli are unique in Europe, and Castel del Monte stands alone on the Murge. There are also the Romanesque cathedrals of Trani, Bari and Otranto, and the pilgrimage site at Monte Sant'Angelo. The catch is that you drive between them.

Lefkada's evenings are for drinking and strolling: cocktail bars in the lanes of Lefkada town, sailing crews on Nidri's harbour strip and the windsurfers' bars in Vasiliki, all quiet early outside high summer.

Puglia goes further. In July and August Gallipoli turns into a proper party town with beach clubs open into the small hours, and DJ nights run along the Salento coast. Bari's old town and Umbertino district keep some life all year.

The two are well matched outdoors, in different ways. Lefkada is steep and green, with mountains above 1,100m, the Dimosari waterfall and dramatic cliff roads. Its real strength is on the water: windsurfing at Vasiliki, kitesurfing at Agios Ioannis and sheltered sailing channels.

Most of Puglia is a gentle plateau of olive groves and dry-stone walls, made for cycling in the Valle d'Itria. The wilder landscape is in the Gargano, with the beech woods of the Foresta Umbra, sea caves and diving off the Tremiti islands.

Lefkada's outings mostly go by boat: Meganisi and the quieter Kalamos and Kastos from Nidri, and Kefalonia's Fiskardo or Ithaca from Vasiliki. On the mainland are the Roman ruins of Nikopolis and the castle town of Parga.

Puglia gives you more, and a different kind of day out: a new small town each day by car. Ostuni, Locorotondo and Cisternino are minutes apart, with Trani and Molfetta along the coast. Matera's cave dwellings, about an hour from Bari, are a highlight that nothing near Lefkada matches.

Puglia is the easier choice with children. The shallow, sandy Salento beaches suit small children all day, villas and masserie with pools are common, and the safari and amusement park at Fasano and the trulli of Alberobello make good outings.

Lefkada works if you stay on the calm east coast or at Agiofili. Its headline west-coast beaches, with steep shelving, surf and cliff stairs, are harder going, and there is little made for children.

Both need a car, but Puglia is easier to manage. Its roads are good and uncrowded, and the main-line trains stop at Polignano a Mare and Monopoli, so a stay along that line works without driving. Its drawback is length: the Gargano is four to five hours from the southern tip.

Lefkada is compact and joined to the mainland by a causeway, but the island's roads wind slowly over the mountains and down the west coast. Buses are too infrequent for beach-hopping, and Nidri and Porto Katsiki clog up in August.

Puglia gives you more to take home: ceramics from the workshop quarter of Grottaglie, papier-mache figures from Lecce, linen and pottery from the Valle d'Itria, and Italian chains around Bari's Via Sparano.

In Lefkada, shopping is the evening walk down Lefkada town's main street for olive oil, honey and lentils, plus hand embroidery in Karya.

Costs are much the same, and in both the expense lies in summer rooms and a hire car, with June and September easier on the budget. In Puglia, meals and wine are cheaper than in most of Italy, while the boutique masserie and paid sun-loungers add up. In Lefkada, the savings come from simple studios and having few entry fees, and the extra costs are boat excursions.

Lefkada's stage is mostly its long-running August folklore festival and village dancing in summer, with little the rest of the year.

Puglia offers far more. Bari's Teatro Petruzzelli has a full opera and ballet season, Martina Franca stages rare operas in its ducal palace courtyard each summer, and the Notte della Taranta gathers the Salento's pizzica tradition into a huge open-air concert at Melpignano.

Neither has a real spa culture, but Puglia relaxes you better. Restored masserie among the olive groves often have their own pools and spas, and there are sulphur springs in the sea caves at Santa Cesarea Terme.

Lefkada's calm comes from its quiet inland villages and east-coast harbours in June or September, with spa treatments limited to a few hotels. In August its busiest resorts are not restful.