Here is the story of our with eBike mis-Adventure:
We arrived about 10:05 AM for a 10:00 reservation, and the bikes were not yet ready. We had to sign releases, but they were not yet printed. The owner went inside to print them, which took a few minutes, and then asked for our help to staple the pages together so he could continue getting the bikes ready.
It took about 1.25 hours before we could start our journey. On occasion, during this time, the owner was muttering about all the maintenance he had to do. He was blaming it on previous customers not telling him that something was wrong, and that he was trusting them to let him know when something was broken or needed maintenance. Among other things with other bikes, the bike I had had a loose handlebar grip, and the left pedal was so loose it was almost falling off. I only discovered this after taking the bike up the street for a test drive.
The plan was to ride to Carpinteria to be there around 12:00 - 1:00 PM for lunch. After less than a mile on the ride, one of the bikes had a failed battery and/or motor, and we had to go back and exchange it. This cost about another half hour of time.
On the way, around half way there at 12:30, we were stranded because a battery died early. I called the owner. He said he could be there in about 15 minutes. We decided to move to a safer location than the side of the road--given that we had 4 kids. I texted the owner the location. After about 40 minutes, I called him to find out where he was. He said he was looking for us but couldn't find us. When I asked him if he got the text of our location, he remarked that he didn't check his phone. So, he was driving around for a half hour, not able to locate us, but didn't think to check his phone or call us. He swapped a bike and a battery, so that was good. We continued on our journey.
About 5 miles from downtown Carpinteria, we had another bike battery failing. We were told these batteries were supposed to last around 30 miles--the owner had even road to Santa Barbara before. However, these batteries were failing after 8-15 miles. That person decided to just try to make it manually--even though eBikes are significantly more heavy and difficult to pedal than regular bikes. We also had an incident where one of the children's feet was caught in the front wheel and spokes. The child was okay--fortunately--but it was terrifying for the mother. These are not the best designed child seats. They need some kind of protection to keep children's feet from getting stuck in the moving wheels.
We made it to Carpinteria and called the owner to come replace some batteries again, and one of the pedals that fell off. We called about 3:25 PM and asked the owner to bring them. We thought it would take about a half hour. After hearing nothing for an hour, I called the owner to check in. He said he was at the location waiting for us for a while. I asked him why he didn't call me if he couldn't find us. He said he can't talk on his phone while driving. So, I wondered which it was: was he in the parking lot waiting for us, or was he driving to the location?
At this point he had wasted about 3 hours of our time with his lack of preparedness, and poor maintenance/condition of his bikes. I told him it was too late for us to bike back. It was 4:30 PM, and it would be dark in an hour (or less), and it would take twice that to get back. We had 4 children and did not want to be biking on the street in the dark. He stated that there was nothing wrong with his bikes, and that we were just tired and didn't want to bike back. I told him we were done, and he needed to take his bikes back. We wanted a refund for all this wasted time and headache. He complained again that only one pedal out of 10 bikes fell off--that's not too bad (BTW, we only had 9 bikes). He would not give us a refund. We had to argue with him.
He took the bikes back, but we had to get a couple Ubers XL back (30 miles), in order to accommodate everyone, to get our cars. He did end up giving $80 back. However, the total cost was about $715, plus $100 or more in Ubers and tips.
Apparently, there is a reason why he only takes cash, Venmo, or Zelle. If you pay by credit card, you could easily dispute the charge. However, these other methods are very difficult to dispute. You pretty much have no recourse.
This was our experience. It was not the "adventure" we were hoping for. I'm not going to tell you that you should not use eBike Adventures--you can make your own decision. Hopefully this review was helpful. read more
