Montpellier or Strasbourg?

The gap here is as wide as it gets. From Montpellier the coast is about 11km away. Fine sand runs from Palavas and Carnon past La Grande-Motte to the empty dunes of l'Espiguette, and Sète adds more beaches west of the lagoon. The water is shallow and warm by late summer, though the nearest beaches are crowded in July and August.

Strasbourg has no sea at all. Its swimming happens in old gravel-pit lakes like the Baggersee, which are lifeguarded in high summer and pleasant on a hot afternoon. That is all there is.

The two eat about equally well, but they feel like different countries. Montpellier is Mediterranean: oysters and mussels from the Thau lagoon, Sète's octopus tielle and Pic Saint-Loup wines. It is at its best in the market halls and casual bistros, and it suits hot weather.

Strasbourg cooks heavier food for colder days. Think choucroute, baeckeoffe and tarte flambée in wood-panelled winstubs with a pichet of Riesling. It also has a stronger fine-dining tier and foie gras of its own, but the restaurants around the cathedral tend to serve the same tourist menus.

Strasbourg has more to see. The pink sandstone cathedral with its astronomical clock, the island old town and Petite France, and the German-built Neustadt together make up a UNESCO-listed townscape. The Palais Rohan alone holds three museums, and the contemporary art museum and the Alsatian Museum add more.

Montpellier's Écusson is attractive, with lanes of hôtels particuliers, the Peyrou terrace and its aqueduct, and France's oldest botanical garden. The Musée Fabre is a fine gallery, and Bofill's Antigone is unusual modern architecture. Overall, though, it offers fewer major sights and less depth.

Montpellier makes for the better night out. The terraces around Place Jean-Jaurès and the Écusson fill on weeknights too. When the bars close, the crowd takes taxis to clubs out towards Lattes and the coast, and in summer the night moves to the beach towns.

Strasbourg has good bars in the Krutenau and around Place Saint-Étienne, including beer cellars and riverside terraces in summer. It has few clubs, though, and the city is mostly quiet by midnight.

Montpellier has the more varied outdoors close to town. Flamingos feed in the lagoons behind the coast and the Camargue is an hour away. To the north the climb up Pic Saint-Loup, the Hérault gorges for canoeing and the Cirque de Navacelles are all within easy reach. The windy coast also suits kitesurfing.

Strasbourg's own landscape is flat river plain, best enjoyed by bike along the Rhine. For proper walking you have to travel about an hour, to the forested Vosges and the castle ruins in the west or the higher ridges of the Black Forest in the east.

Both are excellent bases, and the difference is in what you visit. From Montpellier, trains run to Nîmes and its Roman arena, to Arles and Avignon, and to walled Carcassonne. Closer in, Sète, Aigues-Mortes and Saint-Guilhem-le-Désert make easy trips, so the focus is Roman and medieval southern France.

Strasbourg offers two sets of trips. One is Colmar and the wine route villages such as Riquewihr and Eguisheim. The other crosses the border, to Baden-Baden, Freiburg, Heidelberg and Basel. Both cities need a car for their smaller villages.

With children the two are about even, and what separates them is the kind of trip. Montpellier's family days are built around summer and the sea. The nearby beaches slope so gradually that small swimmers can paddle in safety, and when the midday heat makes the old town hard going, the Lunaret zoo in its woodland or the aquarium and planetarium at Odysseum give you somewhere cooler to go.

Strasbourg is the easier city to get around with a pushchair, being level and compact, and children tend to enjoy a boat ride round Petite France or watching storks on their nests in the Orangerie. Its standout is a whole day at Europa-Park across the Rhine, which Montpellier has nothing to match, though the city's museums offer little for younger visitors.

Both have compact, largely car-free centres and good tram networks. Strasbourg's island centre is flat and it is a true cycling city, so a visitor never needs a car there, and one tram line even crosses into Germany.

Montpellier's Écusson sits on a low hill with slopes and uneven paving. The beaches are reachable by tram and then bus, which is slow in summer. For the gorges and the Camargue, renting a car is much easier.

Neither city is a shopping destination, and the best buys are regional. Strasbourg has more to take home besides food: Soufflenheim and Betschdorf pottery, printed linens and kougelhopf moulds. In December its old Christmas market sells crafts and decorations.

Montpellier's best buys are edible, such as wine, olive oil and honey from the covered markets. There are boutiques in the Écusson, and the Polygone and Odysseum have the chain stores.

Montpellier is slightly easier on a budget. Its students keep plenty of cheap counters and bars going, and lunch menus and market halls stretch your money. Costs rise mainly with restaurant dinners and coastal rooms in July and August.

In Strasbourg, the winstub meals and wine by the pichet are fair value and many sights are free, but hotels cost more. Rooms are especially dear during the Christmas market and the weeks when the European Parliament sits, so the date of your trip matters.

Montpellier has the bigger stage life. Two opera houses share a season with the national orchestra, and the Montpellier Danse festival makes it a major city for contemporary dance. In summer the Radio France festival puts on many free concerts, and the Printemps des Comédiens fills the outdoor theatres of the Domaine d'O.

Strasbourg's strengths lie elsewhere. The Théâtre National de Strasbourg is one of France's leading drama stages, and the autumn Musica festival is devoted to contemporary music. The Opéra national du Rhin plays on Place Broglie, and evenings out need planning around the season.

Strasbourg is the better choice for bathing and rest. The Bains municipaux give it a real local bathhouse with tiled pools, a hammam and saunas. Baden-Baden's Friedrichsbad and Caracalla baths are under an hour away, with more spa towns in the Black Forest.

Montpellier relies on hotel spas. The nearest thermal water is at Balaruc-les-Bains on the Thau lagoon. Long lunches and shaded squares help you slow down, but the student centre is rarely quiet.