Salzburg or Verona?

Neither city has a coast. Both send swimmers to lakes, and the season runs from June to September. Salzburg's Fuschlsee, Wolfgangsee and Mondsee are clear, green and a little cooler, and you get in from lawns and wooden jetties. They make a pleasant hot afternoon rather than a reason to come.

Verona has the better swimming. Lake Garda is larger and slightly warmer, it is a short train ride away at Peschiera, and it has lidos with sunbeds and Sirmione's flat limestone shelves. Expect narrow, crowded shores on summer weekends.

Salzburg eats well in a hearty but limited way: schnitzel, Kasnocken and the Salzburger Nockerl, coffee and cake in the old coffee houses, and beer from wooden barrels in the monastery brewery garden at Mülln. The old town is full of tourist menus, and a few days covers the range.

Verona has more to offer anyone who travels for food. Its Veneto cooking, from bigoli with duck to pastissada, is served in plain osterie around Piazza delle Erbe and in Veronetta, and Amarone, Valpolicella and Soave are made on the doorstep. Neither city has much street food or international variety.

Both centres are UNESCO-listed and both need two or three unhurried days, so the real choice is between eras. Salzburg is a Baroque showpiece built by the prince-archbishops, with the cathedral and the Residenz below the Hohensalzburg fortress. Mozart's two houses and the catacombs of St Peter's add personal and monastic history.

Verona goes further back in time. It has a Roman Arena still in use, a Roman theatre on the hillside, the Scaliger tombs and the bronze doors of San Zeno. Castelvecchio, with Carlo Scarpa's galleries, is its main art museum.

Neither is a party city, but Verona stays up a little longer. In Salzburg an evening means a concert, a late dinner and a litre mug at the long tables of a beer hall, plus a few student bars on Rudolfskai. The old town is quiet by midnight, and people who want clubs take the train to Munich.

In Verona the aperitivo spills across Piazza delle Erbe and Corso Porta Borsari, and the wine bars of Veronetta stay busier late during term. On summer opera nights the crowd leaving the Arena brings the centre back to life around midnight.

Here Salzburg pulls well ahead. Real mountain country begins at the edge of town. The Untersberg cable car rises to about 1,800m, paragliders launch from the Gaisberg, and the Salzkammergut is good for sailing and paddling. The Königssee is half an hour away and the ski areas are about an hour's drive.

Verona's outdoors is gentler and further off. The Valpolicella vineyards and the Adige cycle route suit easy walks and rides. Monte Baldo, the windsurfing at the north end of Garda and the Lessinia plateau are around an hour away, and the Dolomites are too far for a day trip.

Both cities make good bases, but Verona's reach is exceptional. Venice, Giotto's chapel in Padua, Palladio's Vicenza and Mantua are each a short train ride away, and the Garda towns and the wine cellars of Valpolicella and Soave are closer still. A week there can hold a different city every day.

Salzburg's day trips are about lakes and salt: Hallstatt, St Wolfgang, the mines at Hallein and Berchtesgaden, and the clifftop fortress at Werfen, with Munich within reach by train. Several of the lake villages are much easier with a hire car.

The two are evenly matched for families, but children find different things to enjoy. In Salzburg most of the fun is in or near town: the trick fountains and zoo at Hellbrunn, the hands-on Haus der Natur, the fortress funicular and the marionettes, plus wooden slides in the nearby salt mines. The cobbles and steep lanes are hard work with a pushchair.

Verona's flat centre is easier with a buggy. Its big draws, including Italy's largest theme park, the water parks and a drive-through safari zoo, are out around Lake Garda and mostly need a car or a transfer. Summer afternoons there are also hotter.

Both are walking cities with no metro or tram, and in each the main sights are minutes apart. Salzburg has the denser trolleybus network, which reaches Hellbrunn and the Untersberg cable car, and its flat riverside paths are good for cycling.

Verona's centre inside the river loop is flat and mostly closed to traffic. Beyond it the trains do more of the work, with fast lines to Venice, Milan and Peschiera on the lake. In both places, the outlying villages are far easier to reach by car.

Neither is a shopping destination, and the difference lies in what you take home. Salzburg's speciality is Tracht, with dirndls and loden jackets made to measure in workshops around Getreidegasse. It also has the Christmas market on Domplatz and regional cheese at the farmers' market by the Andräkirche.

Verona is the more fashionable of the two, with Italian labels along the marble-paved Via Mazzini. Its best buys are still Amarone, Garda olive oil and pandoro, and serious shoppers head to Milan.

Neither is cheap, but Verona makes a budget go further. Hotels in Salzburg's old town are expensive all year, eating in the centre costs well above the Austrian norm, and rooms get even harder to find in the festival and Advent seasons. A city card and a bed across the river help.

In Verona, everyday meals in Veronetta's osterie and at wine counters are fairly priced, local wine is good value and a walkable centre saves on transport. Rooms are still expensive on opera nights and during trade fairs.

Salzburg is the more serious music city across the whole year. The summer festival brings leading performers to the Grosses Festspielhaus and to the Felsenreitschule, a riding school cut into the cliff. Mozart Week and the Easter Festival add two more seasons, and the Mozarteum and Landestheater keep a programme going in between.

Verona's great strength is one summer spectacle: grand Verdi and Puccini performed on the Roman stone tiers of the Arena. Outside that season, the Teatro Filarmonico offers a modest programme.

Salzburg has the edge for a restful stay. The quiet river paths, the Mirabell gardens and the saunas of the Paracelsus Bad are all in town, and the brine baths of Bad Reichenhall and the thermal springs of the Gastein valley are within reach.

Verona's warm springs are also out of town, at Sirmione's lakeside thermal centre, the villa garden near Lazise and Caldiero. In the city itself, rest comes mainly from long lunches and the evening passeggiata along the Adige.