Siena or Sorrento?

This is Sorrento's ground. The town has no sand, but lidos on piers at Marina Piccola and Marina Grande, a lift down from the cliff and the rocky inlet of the Bagni della Regina Giovanna put deep, clear water a few minutes from your hotel. Space is tight in high summer and much of the shore is paid.

Siena has no sea at all. A swim on the Maremma coast takes a whole day, so in practice you swim in a farmhouse or hotel pool, or you split the trip and give the beach a few nights on the coast.

Both are strong, rooted regional kitchens, and both are thin on anything beyond Italian food. The difference is land against sea. Siena cooks hearty inland dishes: pici, ribollita, cinta senese pork and wild boar, with panforte and ricciarelli from its old bakeries, and the best wine list of the two, with Chianti Classico, Brunello and Vino Nobile all grown nearby.

Sorrento is lighter and more coastal, with gnocchi alla sorrentina, grilled fish, fresh mozzarella and lemons in everything, plus pizza in the Naples tradition. It also has the fine dining that Siena lacks, in the hill villages of the peninsula. In both places the better meals are on the back lanes rather than on the main squares.

Siena is in another league here. The whole UNESCO-listed centre is the attraction, with the Campo and the Palazzo Pubblico, Lorenzetti's Good and Bad Government, the Duomo with its pulpit and Piccolomini Library, Duccio's Maestà and the Sienese school in the Pinacoteca. The seventeen contrade give each quarter its own identity, and the main sights need two or three full days.

Sorrento's old grid of lanes, the San Francesco cloister, the Museo Correale and the odd ravine of the Vallone dei Mulini make a pleasant day or so. Its great cultural sights, Pompeii, Herculaneum and Naples, are day trips rather than part of the town.

Neither town is for a big night out, and both go quiet early for most of the year. Siena's evenings are dinner, wine on the Campo and student pubs, with the Palio nights as the one time the streets stay full until late.

Sorrento's version is the passeggiata, cocktails on a terrace over the bay and piano bars playing Neapolitan song, with a club or two open in summer. Getting to livelier Naples or Capri means staying the night, because the last boats and trains leave early.

Sorrento's setting is the more dramatic, with Vesuvius across the bay, sheer limestone coast, lemon terraces and trails to Punta Campanella and the protected bay of Ieranto. Monte Faito and the Path of the Gods are close, and you can get out on the water by boat or kayak, which inland Tuscany cannot offer.

Siena's landscape is gentler: the bare clay hills of the Crete Senesi and the rolling Val d'Orcia. It is best seen by bike, with the strade bianche starting at the edge of town, or on stretches of the Via Francigena. It is beautiful country, but there are no high peaks and no shoreline.

Both are exceptional bases, and the real difference is how you travel. From Siena the outings are hill towns, wine and abbeys: San Gimignano, Monteriggioni, the Chianti villages, Pienza, Montalcino, Montepulciano, San Galgano and Sant'Antimo, with Florence an easy bus ride away. Most of them are far easier with a car.

From Sorrento the trips are by rail and sea: the Circumvesuviana to Pompeii and Herculaneum, ferries to Capri and along the Amalfi Coast, and the train to Naples. It is car-free, but the summer crowds on trains and buses take some patience.

Neither is set up for children, with no zoos or attractions made for them, and families do best in both with a pool at the hotel or farmhouse. In Siena older children enjoy climbing the Torre del Mangia and seeing the contrada drummers, but the steep streets are hard with a pushchair.

Sorrento's centre is flatter, and boat trips to Capri and the ruins of Pompeii go down well with children. The catch is that swimming is from piers and rocks into deep water, which does not suit toddlers.

Both centres are compact and walkable, and the difference is the terrain. Siena spreads over three ridges, with steep climbs and escalators up from the station, while Sorrento's centre is flat, with only the marinas below the cliff.

Further out, Siena works best with a hire car for the hill towns. In Sorrento a car is more trouble than it is worth, and you rely on a crowded train, slow coast buses and the more comfortable ferries.

Both are modest, souvenir-heavy shopping towns, and serious shoppers go elsewhere for fashion. What you take home differs. Siena's speciality is food and Tuscan craft, such as panforte, pecorino, wine, majolica and contrada scarves, with a big weekly market by the Fortezza.

Sorrento sells lemon everything, plus genuinely local intarsia woodwork, leather sandals made to measure, linen and cameos.

Siena is the somewhat cheaper of the two, though neither is a bargain. Rooms inside its walls are scarce and expensive around the Palio and in summer, but osteria lunches are good value, and staying at an agriturismo or in a nearby town cuts costs further. Entry fees to the Duomo and museums add up.

Sorrento charges resort rates in summer for sea views, sunbeds and boat trips. Cheap trains and buses help, and spring and late autumn bring hotel prices down noticeably.

Siena offers more for music lovers. The Accademia Chigiana's summer concerts and masterclasses in palaces and churches, Siena Jazz, and winter seasons at the Teatro dei Rinnovati and the Teatro dei Rozzi make a serious programme for a small town, although opera means going to Florence.

Sorrento's performances are mostly aimed at visitors: tarantella and Neapolitan song shows, hotel bar pianists, and chamber concerts in the San Francesco cloister in summer. The Teatro di San Carlo in Naples is the place for anything bigger.

Siena has the edge because of the hot springs close by. You can go to the travertine pools at Rapolano Terme, the steaming medieval bath at Bagno Vignoni, the free limestone pools of Bagni San Filippo and Petriolo's sulphur river, and pair them with a quiet farmhouse stay in the hills.

Sorrento's calm comes from cliff-top hotel spas, villa gardens and terraces over the bay. The nearest thermal water is a ferry ride away on Ischia, and its centre is noisier in high summer.