San Marino or Zurich?

Neither city is on the sea, and they offer about the same amount of swimming in very different forms. From San Marino you go down about half an hour to the sandy Romagna shore at Rimini and Riccione, with rows of numbered umbrellas, beach clubs and shallow, warm water.

Zurich swims in the middle of town. It has wooden bathing houses and lawned lidos on the clean lake, plus the Limmat river baths at Letten, where you float downstream with the current. You lie on grass and decks rather than sand, but there is no drive to get there.

San Marino serves the honest cooking of the Romagna hills: piadina, passatelli in broth and hand-rolled strozzapreti, with the republic's own Sangiovese. On the summit, though, the terraces trade on the view, and the better meals are down in Borgo Maggiore or over the border.

Zurich gives you more to eat, at a steep price. There is veal Geschnetzeltes with rösti, winter fondue in the Altstadt guild houses, the old Paradeplatz tea rooms and the casual international places around Langstrasse, though markets and street food are thin.

In San Marino the sight is the town itself. You get the three towers on the crest of Monte Titano, the cliffside path between Guaita and Cesta, and the Palazzo Pubblico as the seat of an ancient republic. It is memorable, but you can see it in half a day.

Zurich has enough to fill a longer stay. The Kunsthaus runs from Monet to Giacometti, and there are also the Swiss National Museum and the Rietberg. Add the Grossmünster, where the Swiss Reformation began, and Chagall's windows in the Fraumünster, and two or three days pass easily.

Once the coaches leave, San Marino's summit goes quiet, and a glass of wine above the lights of the coast is the whole night out. Clubbing means driving down to Rimini and Riccione.

Zurich has a serious club scene built on electronic music. Venues in Kreis 4 and 5 and Zurich West stay open until morning at weekends, and the Street Parade takes over the lake shore every August. In summer, nights move outdoors to the bars in the lake bathing houses, though rounds are dear and weeknights are calm.

Monte Titano gives San Marino cliffs, woodland paths down to Borgo Maggiore and views across the plain to the sea, with gentle Montefeltro farmland beyond. It is fine for a morning, but there are no long trails.

Zurich has the lake, and the Uetliberg and the Albis ridge right at the edge of town. The Alps are about an hour away, with summer hiking on Rigi and Pilatus and winter skiing at Flumserberg. For anyone planning whole days outdoors, Zurich is far ahead.

Day trips are San Marino's strongest suit. San Leo, Urbino, Ravenna's mosaics, Gradara and the Riviera all lie within about an hour or so. Apart from the bus to Rimini, though, most of them need a car.

Zurich still does better because of the train. Lucerne, Bern, Basel, St Gallen, and the Rhine Falls with Stein am Rhein are all easy days out by rail, and Rapperswil is a trip by lake boat. A visitor without a car sees far more of the country.

Children enjoy San Marino's battlements and the cable car up from Borgo Maggiore. However, steep steps make pushchairs hard work and the summit has little built for children. The miniature park, waterparks and shallow beaches are on the coast below, so a car helps.

Zurich is easier in every way. It is safe, its transport copes with buggies, the zoo has a Madagascar rainforest hall, the lake lidos have shallow areas, and the Technorama is a short train ride away. Its quiet evenings suit families with younger children best.

You can walk across San Marino's old town in under half an hour, but nearly every street climbs or drops. Beyond the cable car and the bus up from Rimini, public transport is thin, and the surrounding hill towns realistically need a car.

Getting around Zurich is close to effortless. Trams, S-Bahn trains, funiculars and even the lake boats share one ticket, and the airport is a short train ride from the main station. A car is more nuisance than help.

San Marino's shops lean on souvenirs, collectors' stamps and coins, and perfume, watches and spirits made cheaper by lower taxes. There is also an outlet centre on the valley floor.

Zurich has Bahnhofstrasse, one of the world's great luxury streets, plus watch dealers in the side streets, Niederdorf boutiques and design shops in the Zurich West viaduct arches. The range is narrow beyond luxury and design, but it goes much deeper than anything on Monte Titano.

The two are furthest apart on the biggest items in a trip, the room and the evening meal. A plain hotel and a dinner of strozzapreti and Sangiovese in a valley trattoria near San Marino cost a small fraction of their Zurich equivalents, and a round of drinks, which is often the biggest surprise in Zurich, stays unremarkable. Where San Marino does cost extra is on the summit, where you pay for the view as much as for the plate. Lower taxes on fuel and spirits help to balance that out.

Zurich also charges heavily for things that cost little on Monte Titano, such as museum entry and getting around. The combined transport and museum card takes the edge off, and the lake lidos and drinking fountains are free. Even with careful spending, though, Zurich comes nowhere near San Marino's prices.

San Marino has a small theatre, occasional concerts by local ensembles and the costumed Medieval Days in summer. For opera, people head to Bologna or Pesaro.

Zurich has a full season at the Opernhaus, the Tonhalle Orchestra and the Schauspielhaus, whose plays are mostly in German. There is also jazz and indie at the Rote Fabrik and the open-air Theater Spektakel by the lake. For evenings at a performance, it is the clear choice.

In San Marino the calm comes in the evening, walking the walls once the day crowds have gone. Beyond a few hotel spas, a thermal bath means a separate trip to the coast or the Apennine valleys.

Zurich builds relaxation into the city. There are thermal pools in the stone vaults of the old Hürlimann brewery, and in winter the wooden lake baths become saunas, with cold dips between sessions. The hot springs of Baden are about twenty minutes away by train.