Pula or Vienna?

This is Pula's clearest advantage. Its coast south of the centre breaks into rocky platforms and pebble coves with very clear water and pine shade down to the shore. The wild inlets of Cape Kamenjak give some of the best swimming in Istria. There is no sand, so water shoes are worth packing, and families with small children tend to use the gentler bays around Medulin.

Vienna offers river and lake bathing instead. The Danube Island and the calmer Alte Donau lidos are pleasant on a hot afternoon after sightseeing, but they make a nice extra rather than the reason for the trip.

Vienna has the stronger food culture to explore inside the city. You can eat schnitzel and Tafelspitz in wood-panelled Beisl taverns, have strudel at a marble table in a grand coffee house, and drink young Grüner Veltliner at the Heuriger taverns on the vineyard slopes within the city limits.

Pula has an excellent regional kitchen but a limited choice of restaurants in town. Istrian truffle pasta, scampi buzara, pršut and Malvazija are well worth trying. The best meals tend to be in village konobas inland or at harbours along the coast, so eating well usually means driving out of the city.

Pula has one world-class monument, the remarkably complete Arena, along with the Temple of Augustus, the Arch of the Sergii and Austro-Hungarian forts. You can see all of it comfortably in a day or two.

Vienna works on a different scale. The Hofburg, Schönbrunn and St Stephen's sit within a UNESCO-listed old town, and the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Belvedere and the Leopold hold collections that people cross Europe to see. The Jugendstil buildings and Otto Wagner's architecture add a second great period on top of the imperial one, and the whole city easily fills a week.

Neither city is a party destination, but Vienna has more going on and keeps it up all year. There are late bars under the Gürtel railway arches, electronic nights in former industrial spaces, and deckchair bars on the Danube Canal in summer. In winter the formal balls offer a night out you won't find anywhere else.

Pula's evenings come alive only in summer, and they stay low-key: terrace drinks around the Forum, then beach bars on Verudela or in Medulin. For many visitors the best night is a glass of wine by the harbour with the Arena lit up behind them.

The two are broadly level, but the outdoors means different things in each. In Pula it is the coast: walking, cycling and sea kayaking at Kamenjak, windsurfing in Premantura bay and wreck dives from the naval era. Spring and autumn suit these best, because summer middays are hot.

Vienna's green space is woodland and river. You can hike through vineyards in the Vienna Woods up to the Kahlenberg, explore the Donau-Auen floodplain forest or cycle the flat Danube paths. The Rax and Schneeberg are the nearest real mountains, at about the same distance as Učka is from Pula.

Both make good bases, but for different kinds of trip. From Pula you tour a single region: Venetian Rovinj, the mosaics in Poreč, the truffle hill towns of Motovun and Hum, and the Brijuni islands. Buses are limited, so you will need a car for most of them.

From Vienna the trips cross borders, and you can make most of them by train. Bratislava and Brno are each a short ride away, and the Wachau valley, with Melk and Dürnstein, offers abbeys and vineyards along the Danube.

Vienna is easier with children, and it keeps them busy in any weather. Schönbrunn has the zoo, a maze and a children's museum. The Prater has the giant wheel and its rides. When it rains, the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum and the play areas at ZOOM take over.

Pula's family days are mostly beach days, best in the shallow bays at Medulin. The aquarium in an old fort and climbing round the Arena make good extras. With rocky shores, summer heat and the need for a car, it takes more effort for parents.

Vienna is about as easy as a big city gets. Five U-Bahn lines, trams around the Ring and one integrated ticket take you to Schönbrunn, the Danube Island and even the Heuriger villages, so you won't need a car.

Pula's flat centre is small enough to cover on foot. Beyond it, though, you can't get far without a car or scooter. City buses go out to Verudela, but regional buses are infrequent and the railway is of little use, which makes Kamenjak and the hill towns much easier to reach by car.

Vienna has real shopping streets. There are luxury houses on the Graben and the Kohlmarkt, everyday fashion on Mariahilfer Strasse and independent designers in Neubau. It also has crafts that make good gifts, such as Augarten porcelain, crystal and Loden coats.

In Pula, the things worth taking home are mostly edible. Truffle products, olive oil, Malvazija and pršut from the market hall or straight from the producers beat anything sold on the main pedestrian street.

Pula is slightly the cheaper of the two, mainly because private apartments and simple konobas cost little in spring and autumn. In July and August, rooms and restaurant prices near the Arena climb towards Western European levels, and car hire and boat trips soon add up.

In Vienna, the costs are concentrated in hotels and palace and museum tickets. Many things are free or cheap, though: the passes for public transport, gardens and church interiors, Heuriger buffets and standing places at the State Opera.

For live music, Vienna is in a different league. The State Opera stages a different work almost every night, the Philharmonic plays in the Musikverein's Golden Hall, and the Konzerthaus, the Volksoper and the Burgtheater add to the programme. The city plays its own composers all year round.

Pula has one memorable setting. On summer nights the Arena hosts concerts and film festival screenings under its Roman arches. For the rest of the year the Istrian National Theatre performs drama in Croatian, and there is little else.

Vienna is the better place to unwind. It has the thermal pools at Oberlaa, the tiled Art Deco sauna hall of the Amalienbad and the sulphur springs at Baden, which is half an hour away. Its coffee houses also make lingering part of everyday life.

Pula has no bathing tradition. For spa facilities you need a resort hotel on Verudela or in Medulin. What it offers instead is a calm pace outside high summer, with long coffees on the Forum and walks on coastal paths under the pines.