Ljubljana or Trieste?

The gap here is wide. Ljubljana is inland, so swimming means the Sava in summer, the lakes at Bled and Bohinj, or a day out to Piran on the coast.

Trieste has the Adriatic on its doorstep. Neither city has sand, but in Trieste the sea is part of everyday life from June to September. Residents climb down ladders from the Barcola promenade, there are old-style bathing establishments near the centre, and prettier pebble coves lie at Sistiana and Duino.

The two cooking traditions share roots, and jota bean stew appears in both, but Trieste's food has more character. Its buffet counters carve boiled pork to eat with horseradish, it has its own coffee vocabulary from its Habsburg port days, and there are Adriatic sardoni and farmhouse osmize on the Karst that open for a few weeks at a time.

Ljubljana's food is more homely: Carniolan sausage, štruklji and žganci in gostilna inns, and a Central Market full of Alpine cheeses and pumpkin-seed oil. Its real strength is wine by the glass from Vipava, Brda and Styria, including the orange wines. Both cities have only a narrow range of restaurants.

Trieste has more to see. Piazza Unità opens onto the sea, and there are the Canal Grande and the Borgo Teresiano, the cathedral and castle on San Giusto hill, a Roman theatre, Miramare Castle and the Risiera di San Sabba memorial. Together they fill more days and carry more history.

Ljubljana is smaller and feels like a single design: Plečnik's bridges, colonnades and library, an old town of baroque and Secession buildings, and the castle on its hill. The charm is in the townscape as a whole, with Metelkova's murals as an alternative streak, but its museums are modest and two or three days are enough.

Neither city is made for a big night out, but Ljubljana has more going on after dark. Students fill the terraces along both banks of the Ljubljanica, and Metelkova's small, scruffy clubs in the former barracks stay open late at weekends.

Trieste's evenings are built around the aperitivo: a spritz on Piazza Unità or along the Canal Grande, and in summer the bars on the Barcola seafront. With an older population and few clubs, it is the quieter of the two, especially on winter weeknights.

Both cities have the outdoors close, but Ljubljana has more of it and on a bigger scale. Within about an hour lie Triglav National Park, the Kamnik-Savinja Alps with Velika Planina and the Vintgar gorge. Further west there is rafting on the Soča, and small ski resorts open in winter.

Trieste's landscape is the sea and the Karst: the Strada Napoleonica above the gulf, the Rilke Path at Duino, the Val Rosandra gorge and the Grotta Gigante. It also offers what Ljubljana cannot, with sailing on the gulf and snorkelling and kayaking in the Miramare marine reserve. You can reach the Škocjan Caves from either city.

Both cities are excellent bases, and the trips from each overlap. Piran, Lipica and Postojna can be reached from either, and each city makes a day trip from the other. The real difference is direction. Ljubljana looks inland to the Alps, with Bled, Škofja Loka, Radovljica and the old mining town of Idrija, and it also reaches Zagreb.

Trieste looks west and south. It has Roman Aquileia, star-shaped Palmanova, Cividale, Grado and the Collio wine country close by, Istria by car, and Venice by train, a long day but a realistic one.

Both cities are safe and calm, and neither is built around children. Ljubljana is easier with a pushchair because its centre is flat and mostly closed to cars. Children remember the castle funicular and the Dragon Bridge, and the city also has a small zoo and a puppet theatre that young children can follow without the language.

Trieste has the aquarium that Ljubljana lacks, as well as the Grotta Gigante and the gardens of Miramare, which suit older children best. Its steep, stepped streets are harder going with toddlers, and swimming is off rocks and concrete rather than in sandy shallows.

In both cities the centre is best seen on foot, and neither has a metro. Ljubljana's centre is flatter and mostly pedestrianised, with bike-share and electric shuttles, so visitors hardly need the buses.

Trieste's waterfront is flat too, but the climb to San Giusto is steep, so its dense bus network does more of the work, and boats cross the bay to Muggia. Away from the city, Ljubljana relies on intercity buses or a hired car.

Shopping plays only a small part in either city. Trieste has the ordinary Italian clothing and shoe shops around Corso Italia and antique shops in the lanes of the old town. Ljubljana's best buys are local crafts and produce, such as Idrija lace, gingerbread hearts and salt from the coastal pans, and it has a Sunday flea market on the embankment. From Trieste, the things worth taking home are coffee, Karst wine and presnitz.

The two cities cost much the same, middling by European standards. In Ljubljana you spend almost nothing on transport because you walk everywhere, and the set lunch menus at the inns are good value, but central rooms in summer are priced like Western Europe. In Trieste, buffet meals, coffee at the bar and free swimming at Barcola keep daily spending down, though rooms get harder to find around the Barcolana regatta and in high summer.

Both cities are good for a night at the opera or a concert, but neither has a scene to plan a trip around. Trieste's Teatro Verdi, with its opera, ballet and the operetta inherited from the Habsburgs, gives it a slight edge for opera lovers. Ljubljana is stronger on orchestral music, with the Slovenian Philharmonic, Cankarjev dom and the summer Ljubljana Festival in Plečnik's Križanke courtyard, and there are alternative gigs at Metelkova.

Most theatre in Ljubljana is in Slovene. In Trieste, the Politeama Rossetti stages Italian plays and touring musicals.

Neither city has a bathing culture of its own, so relaxing in either comes down to the slow pace. In Ljubljana that means a quiet, green, car-free centre and long afternoons in riverside cafés, with a large water park and sauna complex on the edge of town and Slovenia's thermal spa towns within about an hour. In Trieste it means long sittings in old coffee houses and sunset walks along the Molo Audace, with the sea as the best way to unwind and only hotel and day spas beyond that.