At the bottom of the Forbidden Valley, past the final turn of Nemesis, you will now find the peaceful, modern lines of AIR. The new area created behind the mighty Nemesis has a more relaxed feel and the slick, turquoise lines give freshness to the area. As you pass the hill lift emerging from the underground station, your attention is suddenly drawn to your right where you see the awesome ‘Air Shop’, which resembles a terminal building at an airport. It becomes very clear as soon as you see an AIR train in action that this is no usual rollercoaster! Riders are not sitting down like an inverted-coaster such as Nemesis but are hanging below the track in a flying position with nothing below them.

Beside the queuing entrances, there is a test seat and this enforces AIR’s originality as the unusual shoulder restraints come normally from above and tighten to fit the needs of the passenger, unlike the dodgy restraints on corkscrew and the automatic tightening on the Nemesis seats, AIR’s seats are something special! 

The virtual queue is a great way to save valuable time as it cuts the queuing time to nearly half! This queue joins the normal queue and then splits into two separate ones, one queue for each station as AIR has two boarding areas and three trains to keep up the required rate of 1800 passengers per hour. As you get closer to the boarding station, you realize the shear size of the vehicles, they are gigantic!!! The queue then separates again into another two lines, similar to Nemesis, one being for front seats and the other for any other rows. If you have not experienced AIR before I would advise you queue the extra 20 minutes for the front seats as you see everything and the first drop is sensational.

The two boarding stations are parallel to each other and continue the modern feel as excitement builds up inside as you see the trains enter and depart the station, waiting for your turn. As your train enters the station you and three other passengers line up between the gates and watch the riders exit the train on the other side. The gates open and you walk forward towards your seat. The restraints are quite similar to an over-the-shoulder restraint like Nemesis, but with a larger and bulkier part to support the waist, the seats also have larger grab handles but these just get in the way as the best way to experience AIR is with your arms stretched out in front of you to give a ‘Superman’ feel........

You pull down the restraint from above and lock it into position above your thighs, as you did this you will have realized that two flaps neatly turn 90 degrees to strap your legs in. When all the passengers are securely in place, the safety stewards give the thumbs up and the lighting in the station suddenly turns blue. The floor then goes down about 20cm and the seats are tilted backwards through 90°. You are now looking straight down at the floor. And while this is all happening, a soft, voice whispers....Prepare for Air.....Assume the position......Now Fly! And at the word fly the train swiftly glides through the tunnel towards the hill lift. 

The hill lift itself passes over a pathway, up a bit higher, levels off and swoops down slowly to the right but gaining speed quickly. The train then dives straight down to the ground into the first drop. At this point you are centimetres from the ground and start wondering if your nose will get scraped off completely!

As you swoop up again out of the drop the track flips over (and obviously the train does too) so instead of lying in a superman position you are now actually lying on your back! So you are basically travelling above the track instead of beneath it performing a manoeuvre that you could only imagine a flying coaster to perform, it is a weird but awesome experience.

The train then glides down, around to the left (which is 'right' when you are travelling on your back, backwards!) and then before you know it the train flips over again back into flying position. The next bit is probably the best part of the ride- after the quick move back into the flying position the train travels very quickly into a tunnel below the pathway going very close to either side of the tunnel.