Brought back from the brink after a gap of 60 years, Northern Ireland’s latest tourist attraction is an exhilarating cliffside wonder of engineering.

iomtoday was invited along to test our nerves on a two and a half hour tour of The Gobbins path, a dramatic coastal walk on the wild side.

After a short hop to Belfast airport from Ronaldsway we collected our hire car and within 40 minutes we had driven the 20 miles to The Gobbins visitor centre at Islandmagee just off the spectacular Causeway Coastal Route.

From here, minibuses take visitors to the start of the three quarter mile path which hugs the sheer cliff face and features 46 flights of rock-cut steps linked by a series of metal bridges that carry you over crashing waves and past secluded coves.

An exhibition display in the visitor centre explains the history of this unique Edwardian attraction.

The original path opened in 1902, the brainchild of railway engineer Berkeley Deane Wise,whose vision it was to use the Belfast and Northern Counties Railway line to attract visitors to this stunning stretch of the Antrim coast.

Hewn out of the local basalt by pick and shovel, The Gobbins captivated sightseers and in its heyday attracted more visitors than the Giant’s Causeway.

But the old Gobbins fell into disrepair after the Second World War, finally closing for good after a landslide in 1954.

But thanks to European funding - which provided half the £7.5m cost- and some impressive 21st century engineering that would rival anything that Wise himself designed, the re-imagined Gobbins reopened in August 2015.

You can only visit by joining an escorted tour, of which there are up to 18 a day.

After watching a safety video and collecting our hardhats, we were driven to the starting point from where it is a steep walk down to the path itself.

As visitors did in its heyday, we entered the path by passing through Wise’s Eye, a narrow entrance carved out of the solid rock by the railway workers.

The narrow path faithfully follows the course of the original for much of its length.

With the sheer cliff face on one side, the roaring waves on the other, and the soaring seabirds overhead, The Gobbins immerses your senses in the power and drama of this breath-taking coastal panorama.

Further along, we came to the oval-shaped tubular bridge, a reworking of one of the old Gobbin’s most iconic sights.

Perched 10m above the swirling sea and spanning the gap to a stack known as Man o’War, intrepid local teenagers would dare each other to cross the original’s top struts tightrope-style.

The modern replacement is wider and sturdier but retains much of the thrill.

At one point the path dives into The Tunnel, part of which is below sea level, and we were plunged into darkness, emerging into bright sunshine again after climbing a steep metal staircase.

Today the path ends just beyond Gordon’s Leap, overlooked by thousands of nesting guillemots, razorbills and kittiwakes, and Northern Ireland’s only on-shore colony of puffins.

We returned the way we came and after being dropped off back at the visitor centre we called into Rinkha’s ice cream parlour just down the road.

The slider, a slab of homemade ice cream sandwiched between two wafers, is a challenge not to be undertaken lightly!

We drove up the peninsula to the little harbour at Portmuck which boasts fabulous views of the Antrim coast and the Isle of Muck to which it’s linked by a natural tombolo.

Next morning, we drove south to the Murlough nature reserve in County Down, a fragile 6,000-year-old sand dune system owned by the National Trust.

To the accompaniment of a cuckoo, we followed a waymarked trail on boardwalks through the dunes to the long sandy beach, set against the dramatic backdrop of Slieve Donard, Northern Ireland’s highest mountain.

Back in Belfast the Lagan waterfront was packed with visitors in the Titanic Quarter.

Belfast is buzzing thanks in part to its Titanic legacy.

And with new attractions like The Gobbins opening on its doorstep, those with a taste for adventure are beating a path to this must-go-to destination.