I love cycling but I'm a wimp about hills. Hubby loves cycling but has had recent knee surgery so when we went past the Monte Carvoeiro shop with electric bikes for rent outside when we were last there in early October we thought we'd give them a go.

Verdict: excellent! The bikes have an accelerator on the LH handle which can be used without any pedalling, like a scooter, or can be turned off if you want to pedal normally - fine for cycling on the flat but no good on hills as the bikes are very heavy. See http://www.citybike-pt.com and attached photo. They are a new franchise with several rental stations in cvo itself and all over the Algarve.

we pottered over to Ferragudo for the first coffee stop, then over the bridge to Portimao, cycled all along the waterfront up to Praia da Rocha, had wonderful sardine/fish lunch in one of the (cheaper than cvo) restaurants there, then cycled back to cvo, and only used one 'blip' (out of 4)off the battery indicator by the time we got back to cvo, despite using the motor for most of the way back.

Minimum charge was for 2 hours. We ended up having a bike each for 24hours costing 80euros for the two of us which we reckoned was expensive but worth an experiment - it was a glorious sunny day, not too hot and ideal for a bike ride. have since looked at martins e-bikes: http://www.martinsebike.com/bike-rental/ which seems to charge a similar price but with a minimum hire of 3days= 70 euros so we might try this out when we're there at New Year.

All in all, a brilliant way to enjoy the scenery and fresh air without having to work too hard - right up my street!

We have seen these around and they do seem very popular.
We did smile at the couple we saw a few times one day cruising around under power when it was an easy pedal only to see them later in the day pushing their bikes back up a slight hill having no battery power left.

Alison wrote: Minimum charge was for 2 hours which I think was 30euros.(this may not be correct so am currently seeing if I can verify costs as would have thought they would be similar to others - see martins bike ref below) We ended up having it for the full day at (I think) 70euros per bike which we reckoned was expensive but worth an experiment - it was a glorious sunny day, not too hot and ideal for a bike ride. have since looked at martins e-bikes: http://www.martinsebike.com/bike-rental/ which seem to be quite a bit cheaper but minimum hire of 3days= 70 euros so we might try this out when we're there at New Year.

We usually walk back from Centiannes by the road, (hilly enough) and last year we noticed quite a few of these bikes on our return walks. Think Tiloli have them as well. €70 per bike does appear expensive (€140 per day?) when you can hire a car for a week in October for around €90. Not as much fun by the sounds of it though.

Having checked on the price we paid I've edited my first post - my memory of the 70 euros must have been for the two of us - sorry about that!