Marbella or Toledo?

Here the gap could hardly be wider. Marbella runs along about 27km of coast with more than two dozen beaches, from the central La Venus and El Fuerte to the dunes at Cabopino. The sand is greyish rather than white and the water is calm, though cooler than further east.

Toledo is hours from the sea, and the Tagus in its gorge is not a river for swimming. If a vacation needs a beach day, it has to be Marbella.

Marbella eats better and more widely. It has Andalusian beach cooking and old-town tapas at one end, a serious tier of tasting-menu kitchens along the Golden Mile at the other, and international restaurants for its cosmopolitan residents. The tourist menus around the port are the weak spot.

Toledo offers the hearty food of La Mancha: partridge, game from the Montes de Toledo, carcamusas, Manchego and convent marzipan. It is honest regional cooking with a narrow range, best eaten in the taverns away from the cathedral.

Toledo is on another level. The whole hilltop town is a monument where Roman, Visigothic, Islamic, Jewish and Christian layers overlap. It has one of Spain's great cathedrals, the synagogues of Santa María la Blanca and El Tránsito, Cristo de la Luz and El Greco's work in Santo Tomé, and it needs two full days.

Marbella has a pretty Casco Antiguo around the Plaza de los Naranjos, a print museum, Dalí bronzes and Roman mosaics at Río Verde. That is pleasant, but for Andalusia's great monuments you drive elsewhere.

Marbella in summer is a place to go out properly. There are champagne bars and clubs facing the yachts in Puerto Banús and beach-club parties along the Golden Mile until dawn, with gentler terraces in the old town. The scene shrinks sharply in winter.

Toledo's evenings are a late dinner and a round of tapas near Zocodover, then quiet lanes once the day visitors leave. A few student bars open late at weekends, but for clubs you take the train to Madrid.

Marbella has the bigger landscapes. Sierra Blanca rises straight behind town, and the hike to La Concha looks across to Gibraltar and Morocco. The fir forests and gorges of Sierra de las Nieves are under an hour inland, and there is sailing, paddleboarding and dolphin-watching on the coast.

Toledo's best outdoor moment is the riverside path around the gorge below its walls, with views from the cigarrales on the far bank. Beyond that lie the flat plains of La Mancha and the low Montes de Toledo, with Cabañeros a longer drive away.

Both make excellent bases, but they open up different parts of Spain. From Marbella you reach Ronda's gorge, Málaga's Alcazaba and Picasso Museum, Gibraltar and white villages such as Casares, with Granada possible on a long day. You really need a car for all of this.

Toledo's trump card is Madrid, about half an hour away by fast train, which puts the Prado on your doorstep. Aranjuez, El Escorial and the windmills of Consuegra are also within reach, and Segovia and Cuenca make full but worthwhile days.

Marbella is much easier with children. It has sheltered beaches with lifeguards in season, a long flat promenade for scooters and buggies, and resorts built around pools. Along the coast there are a zoo, water parks, an aquarium and a cable car, best reached by car.

Toledo charms children with its swords, armour and the castle-like Alcázar, and the history theme park on the outskirts is made for them. The centre is a different story, with steep cobbles, crowded churches and fierce summer afternoons, so a short stay works best.

Toledo is the easier place to be without a car. Almost every sight lies inside an old town you can cross on foot in twenty minutes, and public escalators lift you up from the car parks below. The climb and the twisting cobbles are tiring, though.

Marbella stretches thinly from San Pedro to Cabopino along a motorway. The centre and the promenade are walkable, but there is no train, the buses are slow and most visitors end up hiring a car or using taxis.

Marbella is where you shop for fashion. Puerto Banús lines up international labels and jewellers in front of the yachts, with a department store and malls nearby, and the old town has linen, leather and ceramics. Beyond the big names there is not much to browse.

Toledo's shopping is about craft. Look for damascene inlay, Toledo steel, Talavera ceramics and convent marzipan, and favour workshops over the souvenir stock near the cathedral.

Toledo is clearly the cheaper place to spend a few days, and the difference shows most in the basic cost of eating, drinking and sleeping. In Marbella you pay for the setting: the glamour of Puerto Banús and the Golden Mile sets the price of a lounger, an afternoon at a beach club or dinner by the port, and in summer rooms cost far more than elsewhere on the coast. The old-town tapas bars and the inland neighbourhoods charge normal Andalusian prices, and accommodation becomes much more reasonable from autumn to spring.

In Toledo, everyday spending stays modest all year, because the taverns away from the cathedral cater to Spanish customers rather than a moneyed international crowd. Sightseeing is where the money goes. Each monument charges its own entry, so a determined day of churches, synagogues and El Greco paintings adds up. A room with a view of the Tagus inside the walls is the other indulgence, and sleeping in the newer town below the hill keeps the bill down.

Neither city is a destination for performance, but Marbella offers a little more, mainly in summer. Big pop and rock acts play an open-air quarry amphitheatre, and beach clubs and hotels host concerts. Its flamenco shows are aimed at visitors.

Toledo has the handsome Teatro de Rojas with a regional programme, occasional organ and choral music in the churches, and the great Corpus Christi procession. For opera or serious concerts, Málaga serves one city and Madrid the other.

Marbella has a long tradition as a place to rest. Spa resorts, retreats and detox clinics line the Golden Mile and the hills behind it, and the mild months from October to May bring golf, sea walks and slow lunches. High summer is far from restful.

Toledo has only a few Arab-style baths and hotel spas. Its calm comes from the quiet lanes and river views at dawn and dusk, which is enough for a slow evening but not for a restorative stay.