Ronda or Segovia?

Neither is a beach destination, but Ronda can at least get you to the sea. The long, sandy and heavily built-up beaches near San Pedro de Alcántara and Estepona are about 50km away, down a winding mountain road. With a car, that makes a full day out.

Segovia is on the plateau far from any coast. The best it offers is a hotel pool, a municipal pool or a cold dip in a Guadarrama reservoir.

Segovia is the town people travel to for a meal. Its wood-oven roasts, suckling pig and milk-fed lamb, are a reason to visit in themselves, served with La Granja's big white beans and a Ribera del Duero red.

Ronda's mountain cooking is hearty but less of a draw: oxtail stew, game, cured hams, and chestnuts and mushrooms from the Genal valley in autumn. It is best eaten in the Mercadillo's tapas bars rather than on the gorge-view terraces. Both towns offer little beyond their regional food.

Segovia has more heritage per street. A Roman aqueduct, a late Gothic cathedral, the Alcázar on its rock and a run of arcaded Romanesque churches together make a UNESCO old town that easily fills a day and repays a second.

Ronda's main sight is its setting: the Puente Nuevo over El Tajo, with the Moorish town on one side and the Mercadillo on the other. Around it are a few strong sights, including one of Spain's oldest bullrings, very well preserved Arab baths and the rock-cut stairway at the Casa del Rey Moro. In both towns the museums are small.

Neither town is for a big night out, but Segovia stays up a little later. Its university students keep a few bars open past midnight at weekends, after the tapas round on Plaza Mayor.

In Ronda the evening ends with a late dinner and a drink around Plaza del Socorro. The town is quiet by the early hours, except during the September fair.

Ronda has more to offer outdoors. Grazalema's unusually green limestone sierra and the Spanish fir forests of the Sierra de las Nieves lie on either side of the town. You can walk from the town into the gorge, the cliffs draw climbers, and El Chorro's walkway is an easy drive away.

Segovia has fine mountains too. The Guadarrama's pine forests at Valsaín, the high passes and the glacial lakes below Peñalara are all close. Its winter snow adds a season that Ronda lacks.

Segovia has the slight edge, mostly because so much is reachable without a car. Madrid is under half an hour by fast train, Ávila and La Granja's palace gardens are close, and with a car you can add Pedraza, Sepúlveda and El Escorial.

Ronda's outings are white villages such as Setenil, Zahara and Grazalema, with Acinipo and the painted cave of La Pileta close by. These are lovely, but they really need a hire car. Seville and Málaga each take one and a half to two hours.

Segovia is easier with children. Its cliff-top Alcázar looks like a storybook castle and has a tower to climb, the aqueduct impresses even small children, and La Granja's gardens give them room to run.

Ronda's attractions for children, the bridge, the walk down the gorge and the nearby caves, suit older children better, and its high, exposed viewpoints call for care. Families tend to stay in the countryside with a pool. Both towns have steep cobbles that make pushchairs hard work.

Both towns are easy to explore on foot, and the difference is how you arrive. Segovia's sights run along one ridge, and its high-speed station is a bus ride from the centre, with fast trains to Madrid.

Ronda's station is in town, but its trains and buses are slow and infrequent, so a car does most of the exploring, and parking in the old town is tight.

There is little shopping in either town, and the best things to take home are edible. In Ronda that means local wine, cured meats and convent sweets from Carrera Espinel and the streets near the bridge. In Segovia it means boxed ponche cake and La Granja beans along Calle Real, and Madrid is close enough for real shopping.

Costs are much the same, but they rise at different times. Ronda costs more at Easter, during the September fair and in hotels overlooking the gorge, and a hire car is the main extra.

Segovia costs more on summer weekends, when visitors arrive from Madrid, and the famous roast dinners by the aqueduct are expensive. Midweek in winter it is a cheap place to stay.

Segovia has more to see, mostly at festival times. In spring the Titirimundi puppet festival fills its squares, summer brings concerts to churches and palace gardens, and the Teatro Juan Bravo hosts touring shows.

Ronda offers small-scale flamenco for visitors, and its big event is the Corrida Goyesca, a bullfight in eighteenth-century costume at the September fair.

Neither town has a spa culture, and Ronda's Arab baths are a monument rather than a place to bathe. The quiet is found in different places. In Ronda it comes from farmhouses among olive groves with pools and wide views. In Segovia it comes from evening walks along the walls and the pine-scented air of the sierra.