Munich or Rothenburg ob der Tauber?

Neither city has a coast, but Munich at least makes a good summer swimming day. Locals sunbathe on the gravel banks of the Isar at the Flaucher, and the clear, fresh alpine water of the Starnberger See and the Ammersee is under an hour away by S-Bahn. In Rothenburg, swimming means the town's outdoor pool or a drive of about an hour to artificial lakes such as the Altmühlsee.

Munich eats far better. Besides the beer halls and the beer gardens, where by custom you can bring your own picnic, it has the Viktualienmarkt, a serious coffee-and-cake habit, starred restaurants and good Italian, Turkish and Balkan cooking.

Rothenburg's food is Franconian and the choice is narrow: Schäufele, bratwurst and Silvaner in the squat Bocksbeutel bottle, plus the sugary Schneeball pastry. Many places around the Marktplatz cook for coach parties. The better meals are in family-run guesthouses and wine taverns away from the square.

Munich has far more to see, and it can fill several days. There are the old masters of the Alte Pinakothek and the rest of the Kunstareal, the Residenz and Nymphenburg, and the huge Deutsches Museum. Its old town is handsome, though much of it was rebuilt after the war.

In Rothenburg the town itself is the sight: a walled medieval whole seen from the wall walk, the Plönlein and the Rathaus tower. Its treasures are few but fine, above all Riemenschneider's Holy Blood Altar and the Medieval Crime Museum, and a day covers them well.

Munich offers a real night out. It runs from beer halls to the cocktail and gay bars of the Glockenbachviertel and a few techno clubs that stay open until morning at weekends, though many neighbourhoods are quiet on weeknights. In late September the Oktoberfest takes over the city for just over two weeks.

Rothenburg has almost no nightlife. Once the day visitors leave, evenings mean wine taverns, inn dining rooms and the night watchman's walking tour, and the lanes are silent by eleven.

Munich has the Alps on its doorstep. Within about an hour or two you can be hiking or skiing around Garmisch and the Zugspitze, or cycling and sailing in the Five Lakes region. In town there is the English Garden, with surfers on the Eisbach, and cycle paths that follow the Isar south.

Rothenburg's countryside is gentle and small in scale. Paths drop from the walls into the Tauber valley, past mills and orchards, and the Tauber valley cycle path runs downstream through vineyards. There are no mountains or large lakes nearby.

Both towns make good bases for day trips, but Munich reaches further and is easier to travel from. Augsburg, Nuremberg, Regensburg, Salzburg and Innsbruck are all within reach by train, and so are Neuschwanstein and Herrenchiemsee.

Rothenburg has the Romantic Road on its doorstep. Dinkelsbühl, Nördlingen inside its meteorite crater and Würzburg's Residenz are all within about an hour, but the train journeys are awkward, so you will want a car.

Munich is much easier with children over several days. It has the Hellabrunn zoo along the Isar, the hands-on sections of the Deutsches Museum, the transport museum, beer gardens with playgrounds, and lake beaches in summer.

Children love Rothenburg's ramparts and the night watchman with his lantern, and older ones are gripped by the Medieval Crime Museum. Beyond that there is little made for them, and the cobbles are hard work with a pushchair.

Both centres are easy on foot, but Munich also has an integrated U-Bahn, S-Bahn and tram network that reaches the museums, the lakes and the airport. Most day trips also run on regional trains, so you need no car at all.

You can cross Rothenburg's walled town in fifteen minutes, though the cobbles and the steep climb back from the valley take some effort. Beyond the walls, travel is harder: the branch line needs a change at Steinach and buses are sparse, so a car is the practical choice.

Munich has proper shopping. There are the luxury houses on Maximilianstrasse, department stores along Kaufingerstrasse, the long-established Dallmayr delicatessen, Tracht tailors and independent boutiques in Glockenbach and Schwabing.

Rothenburg sells mainly Christmas, all year round: glass baubles, nutcrackers and Erzgebirge carvings, alongside teddy bears and cuckoo clocks. Its Christmas market on the Marktplatz is one of Germany's most atmospheric, but there is almost no fashion or everyday shopping.

Rothenburg is the cheaper stay, and in both places the room is most of the bill. Munich has no truly cheap season: hotels are dear all year and very dear while the Oktoberfest or a big trade fair is on, so your dates matter as much as your choice of hotel. Restaurants charge what you would pay in any Western European capital, but beer-hall cooking is fair value, the English Garden and the lakes cost nothing, and several museums charge only a token fee on Sundays.

Rothenburg's premium is narrower, though it never goes away. The old guesthouses inside the walls and the tables around the Marktplatz always cost more than in an ordinary Franconian town, and most of all in December and on summer weekends. A midweek stay away from those peaks is cheaper, but the real saving comes from sleeping outside the gates or in a nearby village and walking in.

This is the widest gap between the two. Munich is one of Europe's great music cities. The Bavarian State Opera plays in the National Theatre, three orchestras of real standing perform in halls such as the Herkulessaal, the Cuvilliés Theatre stages chamber opera and the Gärtnerplatztheater puts on operetta.

In Rothenburg, performance means history. Each year the Meistertrunk festival play is staged in costume, and there is summer open-air theatre and organ and choral music in St Jakob's. On most evenings there is no show to go to.

Munich has a bathing culture of its own. There is the Art Nouveau Müller'sches Volksbad with its Roman-style steam bath, there are textile-free public saunas with infusion rituals, and one of Europe's largest thermal bath complexes is at Erding, about forty minutes away.

Rothenburg's calm comes from its emptied lanes early in the morning and after the coach groups leave. For thermal bathing you need to drive about an hour to Bad Windsheim or Bad Mergentheim.