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This sense of manic hysteria isn’t simply confined to the time you spend in your seat. The mere practicalities of loading and unloading a ride provides moments that will leave the theme park fan open-mouthed. It is well known that fairground crews can operate coasters with phenomenal efficiency.

Coasters like EuroStar and Olympia Looping are capable of operating four or even five trains at peak times, keeping capacity sky-high, while the gargantuan Wildwasser 3 Log Flume operates with such breathtaking swiftness that the queue keeps moving at a speed that approaches normal walking pace. Slow loading means longer queues, and longer queues mean fewer ticket sales, therefore nothing is allowed to slow operations for an instant.

Better still are the loading procedures for the spin rides. A busy night on a Top Scan, for example, will see all 30 new riders sorted into groups and standing on the platform ready to board before the pods have even been lowered into position.

If this sounds a trifle risky, then the unabashed mania of a busy Break Dance is quite simply awesome, with punters gathering at the edge of the ride, token in hand, as the ride slows, then surging onto the platform as soon as they feel capable of remaining on their feet. For a few seconds, everyone battles it out for seats, while staff frenziedly collect tokens from the successful. A hooter sounds, and the ride gets started while the last of the losers are still running to safety.

It may not be exactly civilised, nor is it what the Health and Safety Executive would advise, but it’s the only ride on Earth where you can get an adrenalin rush merely from trying to get a seat. For any cynics who doubt the efficiency of these methods, suffice to say that a 48-seater Breakdance can be loaded in little over ten seconds.

The liberating thing about such rides is that, despite the frenzied atmosphere, the showmen clearly trust the punters not to do anything too silly. Better still, riders react accordingly and accept the need to look after themselves, while maintaining the all-important sense of urgency.

While theme parks (understandably) work on the basis that people will always do something moronically stupid if they are given half a chance, there is something truly invigorating about being trusted to stand casually around a speeding ride without needing to be being fenced in, or being told when it is safe to hop onto the platform.

If someone is overly-optimistic, jumps aboard too early and takes a fall, there’s no Health & Safety enquiry, and no call to Claims Direct, they just get back up and carry on hunting a seat. No nanny-state here, you’re responsible for your own actions, just how things should be.

Of course, this would all mean nothing if the rides themselves weren’t up to scratch. Fortunately, this isn’t a problem. For all the conflicting demands placed upon their design, the coasters that have graced the German fair circuit, such as Thriller, Dreier Looping, Olympia Looping, and EuroStar, are among the finest ever built, and are certainly four of the wildest and most intense coasters you could ever hope to ride.

No less impressive is Star World, the vast enclosed family coaster that pre-dated the current craze for spinning coasters, and boasts a façade that is quite simply mind-blowing, featuring the enormous Galaktos, a fully animated alien robot clad in his outsize day-glo orange space suit, whose sole purpose in life is to lure in the punters. Such extravagance would be commendable from a theme park ride, but from a travelling ride it is astounding.

However, let’s not waste time talking about roller coasters. They may be generally regarded as the “King of the amusement park”, but on the fairground it is the spin ride that undoubtedly bears the crown. A visit to a major fair will undoubtedly reveal a multitude of rides that will be completely unknown to the average theme park fan, as almost everything from the major spin ride manufacturers appears on the fairs first, before eventually making it into the parks. The supremacy of the spin ride is perfectly justified, for despite the world-class quality of many travelling coasters, there is not a coaster on Earth can compare to the sheer fun and thrill of a well-run spin ride.

There will no doubt be those who scoff at the idea that a good spin ride is superior to a roller coaster, so allow me to present my case. Ride a roller coaster, and you always know what you’re going to get. However ingenious the design may be, the train will always perform the same actions in the same order, no matter how many times you ride. You know perfectly well that whatever happens for the 2 or 3 minutes you are in motion, somebody somewhere has scripted it all out in the tiniest detail detail.

With a spin ride, this is not the case. Ideally, the ride will be run manually, meaning that not even the operator is entirely sure how long the ride will last, or what manoeuvres you are going to perform. In many cases, not even the operator has total control, as your seat will quite often be spinning and flipping under the sole jurisdiction of Sir Isaac Newton. There is nothing in life more invigorating than a bit of spontaneity, and this where a good spin ride lands a winning blow against all other types of ride.

Combine this spontaneity with the usual fairground melee of music, lighting and special effects (all of which are likely to be different every time you ride), and you have a level of euphoric mayhem that is unrivalled elsewhere. Continues...