Mostar or Rovinj?

This is where the two part company most clearly. Mostar is inland, and its swimming means a cold plunge in the Neretva or a day out to the pool beneath the Kravica waterfalls, with the Adriatic at Neum more than an hour's drive away.

Rovinj has the sea at its door: kilometres of limestone ledges, pebble coves and bathing platforms through the Golden Cape, very clear water and islands a short boat ride off. It is rock rather than sand, so water shoes help, but for a swimming vacation there is no contest.

Rovinj eats better and more widely. Its kitchen draws on both the sea and the Istrian hinterland, so grilled fish, scampi buzara, truffle pasta and peppery olive oil sit alongside a few refined restaurants and countryside konobas worth a drive.

Mostar's cooking is hearty and honest, built on charcoal-grilled ćevapi, burek and slow-cooked stews, with Žilavka and Blatina wines and the ritual of Bosnian coffee. Beyond that home cooking the choice runs thin, though the everyday eating is more filling and less tourist-driven a few lanes back from the river than in Rovinj's harbour.

Mostar offers more to understand. The rebuilt sixteenth-century bridge and its divers, the Kujundžiluk, the Koski Mehmed Pasha Mosque and the carpeted Ottoman houses, followed by Austro-Hungarian streets and war-damaged façades, fill a day or two with real history.

Rovinj's draw is the townscape itself: Venetian houses rising to St Euphemia's bell tower, the Balbi Arch and the lane of Grisia. Add the Batana House and a small town museum and it is a lovely afternoon, but lighter than Mostar's mix of empire, faith and recent conflict.

Neither town is a night out, and evenings in both revolve around a long dinner and a drink with a view. In Mostar that view is the lit bridge from a riverside terrace, with a few student clubs keeping weekends going later. In Rovinj it is the sunset from the rocks and a waterfront cocktail or wine bar, with a couple of dance venues only in high season.

Both are good for the outdoors, but the settings differ completely. Mostar is ringed by bare karst and the jagged Prenj range, with rafting and kayaking in the Neretva canyons, the Buna spring at Blagaj and the birdlife of Hutovo Blato, which makes it rugged and mountainous, if too hot for hiking in high summer.

Rovinj is gentler and shaped by the sea: flat gravel paths through the Golden Cape forest, sea kayaking and diving around the archipelago, the green channel of the Lim Fjord and quiet vineyard roads inland. Choose Mostar for wilderness and Rovinj for easy coastal walks and time on the water.

Rovinj has the richer spread of excursions within easy reach. Pula's Roman amphitheatre and Poreč's mosaic-filled Euphrasian Basilica are each well under an hour away, the hill towns of Motovun, Grožnjan and Hum lie among truffle woods, and Piran and Trieste make longer trips across the border.

Mostar's outings are smaller and more atmospheric: the dervish tekke at Blagaj, the walled village of Počitelj, the stećci at Stolac and Tito's bunker at Konjic. Sarajevo is the one major city, a long day out by train through the Neretva gorge. In both places a car makes most of this far easier.

Rovinj is the easier place to bring children. Resorts and campsites with pools and playgrounds, boat trips, gelato on the harbour and flat, shaded park paths fill a week without much planning, though the rocky shore means water shoes and a watchful eye.

Mostar works for a day or two: the bridge divers, a minaret climb and a swim at Kravica stick in young memories, and restaurants are relaxed about children. Steep, slippery cobbles and a valley that bakes in summer make a longer family stay hard going.

Both centres are walkable and both have treacherous polished cobbles, but Rovinj makes life on foot easier. Its car-free old town connects along a promenade to the swimming rocks and the forest park, bikes cover the coast paths and taxi boats reach the islands.

Mostar's sights fit into a short riverside walk, yet its buses are designed for residents, and Blagaj, Počitelj and Kravica need a car or tour. It does have a train to Sarajevo, which Rovinj lacks.

The real difference here is what you carry home. Mostar's Kujundžiluk sells hammered copper coffee sets, kilims and Turkish-style lamps, though the pieces worth buying come from a craftsman at work in the shop, not from the imported souvenir stock.

Rovinj sells Istrian produce instead: truffles, olive oil, Malvazija and Teran wine, along with work from the small galleries and artists' studios along Grisia. If you want fashion or design, you will have to go elsewhere from either town.

Mostar is far cheaper. Rooms in family guesthouses, grilled dinners, local wine and coffee all cost little, and walking a few streets back from the bridge brings prices down further.

In high summer Rovinj is priced as a fashionable Mediterranean resort, with harbourside restaurants charging for the view and fish sold by weight. Apartments, campsites and a visit in late spring or September help, but it will never match Mostar for value.

Neither town offers much for an evening of performance, and both come alive slightly only in summer. Mostar has a national theatre and a youth theatre, mostly performing in local languages, plus open-air festival concerts. Rovinj has its own curiosity in the bitinada, the unaccompanied singing tied to the batana boats, as well as concerts in St Euphemia, while Pula's Roman arena nearby hosts big summer shows.

Rovinj is the better place to unwind properly. The larger resort hotels along the shore have well-equipped pools, saunas and treatments open to outside guests, and May, June and September bring long lunches, late swims and walks in the pines.

Mostar's old hammam is a monument rather than a working bath, and spa options are limited to a few hotels. What it does offer is slowness: long coffees in the shade and the quiet hours by the river once the day visitors have left.