Salzburg or Zagreb?

Neither city is a beach destination, but Salzburg has the better swimming. Fuschlsee, Wolfgangsee and Mondsee are less than an hour away. Their clear green water is entered from lawns and wooden jetties below steep hills, so a hot day can become a scenic afternoon out.

Zagreb's swimming is closer to the centre but plainer. Lake Jarun is a former gravel pit with pebbly shores and rowing lanes, and Bundek is smaller. The Adriatic is two hours' drive away, so sea and sand mean adding a separate stop on the coast.

Both cities serve hearty Central European cooking, but Zagreb eats a little better day to day. Dolac market sets the rhythm each morning, and štrukli and Zagorje sausages are easy to find. Wines from Plešivica and Slavonia fill the glasses on the Lower Town café terraces.

Salzburg is at its best with coffee and cake in the old coffee houses, or beer from wooden barrels at the Augustiner monastery brewery in Mülln. Many old-town restaurants serve the same tourist menus at high prices, so the better schnitzel and Kasnocken are found in the inns of the outer districts and on the hills.

Salzburg has the more striking heritage. Its old town is a single UNESCO-listed Baroque ensemble built by the prince-archbishops, with the cathedral, the Residenz and Mozart's birthplace a few minutes apart. Hohensalzburg looks down on it all from the cliff.

Zagreb's appeal is quieter and split in two: the medieval Upper Town with St Mark's tiled roof and the Stone Gate, and the Austro-Hungarian Lower Town around the Green Horseshoe. Its museums are good rather than famous, from the Mimara to the Museum of Broken Relationships. Mirogoj cemetery is the sight most visitors remember.

Zagreb is clearly the better city for a night out. Café-bars switch from coffee to drinks as the evening goes on, Tkalčićeva fills with terraces, and in summer the crowd moves out to the lakeside clubs at Jarun. Students keep alternative venues going through the year.

A Salzburg evening is a concert, a late dinner and a litre mug in a beer hall, and the old town is quiet by midnight. Rudolfskai has a few student pubs that stay open later, but anyone looking for clubs takes the train to Munich.

Salzburg is the clear winner for outdoor travellers, because the Alps begin at the city limits. The Untersberg cable car climbs to about 1,800m for ridge walks, and the Gaisberg is used for paragliding. The Salzkammergut lakes offer sailing and paddling, the Königssee is half an hour away, and the big ski areas are about an hour's drive.

Zagreb's countryside is gentler. Medvednica's beech woods and mountain huts start at the edge of the city, Maksimir park has lakes and oak woods, and the Sava embankments suit cyclists. Plitvice's waterfalls are the big draw, but they are two hours' drive away.

Salzburg has the stronger choice of day trips, led by Hallstatt on its narrow lakeshore. You can go down into salt mines at Hallein and Berchtesgaden, see the clifftop fortress at Werfen, or take the train to Munich in about an hour and a half. A hire car makes the lake villages much easier to reach.

Zagreb's excursions are pleasant but less famous. To the north, Zagorje has Trakošćan castle and Marija Bistrica's pilgrimage church, Varaždin has a Baroque centre, and Samobor is known for its cream cake. Ljubljana makes a long day out.

Salzburg has more to keep children busy. The trick fountains at Hellbrunn soak unsuspecting visitors, the zoo is next door, and Haus der Natur is hands-on. Just outside the city, the salt mines have wooden miners' slides and boat rides on underground lakes. The steep cobbled lanes are hard work with a pushchair, though.

Zagreb is the easier city to push a buggy around, with a flat Lower Town and trams that take pushchairs. The Technical Museum's old trams and planes, the zoo in Maksimir and summer afternoons at Jarun fill a few relaxed days. Neither city has a theme park.

Both cities are easy to get around, and their main sights are within a short walk. In Salzburg, trolleybuses do the work instead of trams, and the flat riverside paths make cycling easy. Trains run to Munich and Vienna, but the slow regional buses push many visitors into a car for the lakes.

Zagreb runs on a dense web of blue trams, and a very short funicular saves the climb to the Upper Town. Trams do slow in rush-hour traffic. You only need a car for the Zagorje castles and Plitvice.

Salzburg has slightly more worth shopping for. Getreidegasse's wrought-iron guild signs make even the chain shops look good, and the city is a real place to buy Tracht, with dirndls and loden jackets made to measure. In Advent, the Christmas market on Domplatz is one of the oldest in the region.

Shopping in Zagreb is everyday. Ilica is lined with chains and some local fashion. The souvenirs worth taking home are red licitar hearts, neckties and Plešivica wine, and Britanski trg has a Sunday flea market. Neither city has much luxury shopping.

Zagreb costs a good deal less. Central apartments, trams, museums and market food are all reasonably priced. Only the upmarket restaurants and the best hotels reach Western European levels.

Salzburg is expensive all year, and rooms and restaurant tables become scarce and costly during the summer festival and Advent. Staying across the river, eating in the outer beer halls and buying a city card keep the costs down.

Salzburg is in another league for classical music. In summer, the Salzburg Festival fills the Felsenreitschule and the Grosses Festspielhaus with leading performers, and Jedermann is played in front of the cathedral. Mozart Week and the Easter Festival add two more seasons, and the Mozarteum and the Marionette Theatre keep music going all year.

Zagreb has a solid season of its own, with opera and ballet at the Croatian National Theatre and the Zagreb Philharmonic at Lisinski. It also has more jazz and rock, including open-air courtyard concerts and a summer festival at Jarun. Much of the spoken theatre is in Croatian, however.

Salzburg is better placed for spa days. The Paracelsus Bad has saunas and a pool in the city park, the brine spa town of Bad Reichenhall is about twenty minutes away, and the Gastein valley's thermal springs and Belle Époque hotels make a longer excursion.

Zagreb's own options are mostly hotel wellness floors. Its thermal pools are in the Zagorje resorts of Tuheljske and Stubičke Toplice, about an hour north. Both cities are slow-paced, but Zagreb relaxes over coffee on café terraces, while Salzburg relaxes in its gardens and on wooded ridges.