🔗 Share this article

"Locals dub this location an enigmatic zone of Transylvania," explains a tour guide, his breath creating puffs of condensation in the crisp evening air. "Numerous people have vanished here, many believe there's a gateway to another dimension." Marius is escorting a visitor on a night walk through commonly known as the planet's most ghostly woodland: Hoia-Baciu, a section spanning 640 acres of primeval indigenous forest on the fringes of the Transylvanian city of Cluj-Napoca.

Centuries of Mystery

Stories of bizarre occurrences here go back a long time – this woodland is called after a area shepherd who is reportedly went missing in the long ago, along with 200 of his sheep. But Hoia-Baciu achieved international attention in 1968, when a defense worker named Emil Barnea captured on film what he reported as a UFO hovering above a round opening in the centre of the forest.

Numerous entered this place and failed to return. But don't worry," he continues, facing the visitor with a grin. "Our tours have a flawless completion rate."

In the years that followed, Hoia-Baciu has drawn yogis, traditional medicine people, UFO researchers and supernatural researchers from across the world, interested in encountering the strange energies reported to reverberate through the forest.

Current Risks

Despite being one of the world's premier destinations for lovers of the paranormal, the forest is facing danger. The western districts of Cluj-Napoca – an innovative digital cluster of a population exceeding 400,000, called the innovation center of the region – are encroaching, and developers are advocating for authorization to remove the forest to construct residential buildings.

Barring a small area home to locally rare oak varieties, the grove is lacking legal protection, but Marius hopes that the initiative he co-founded – a dedicated preservation group – will help to change that, motivating the government officials to acknowledge the forest's significance as a travel hotspot.

Chilling Events

While branches and fall foliage split and rustle beneath their footwear, the guide describes various local legends and claimed supernatural events here.

• A well-known account tells of a five-year-old girl going missing during a group gathering, later to rematerialise five years later with no memory of what had happened, showing no signs of aging a moment, her garments lacking the tiniest bit of dirt.
• More common reports describe smartphones and photography gear unexpectedly failing on entering the woods.
• Emotional responses range from complete terror to feelings of joy.
• Certain individuals state noticing unusual marks on their bodies, detecting disembodied whispers through the trees, or experience fingers clutching them, despite being convinced they're by themselves.

Scientific Investigations

Although numerous of the tales may be hard to prove, there is much visibly present that is certainly unusual. Everywhere you look are trees whose bases are warped and gnarled into unusual forms.

Various suggestions have been given to clarify the abnormal growth: that hurricane winds could have bent the saplings, or inherently elevated radioactivity in the soil cause their unusual development.

But formal examinations have turned up no satisfactory evidence.

The Legendary Opening

The expert's excursions permit guests to participate in a modest investigation of their own. When nearing the meadow in the forest where Barnea photographed his famous UFO pictures, he passes the traveler an ghost-hunting device which detects electromagnetic fields.

"We're venturing into the most powerful section of the forest," he says. "Discover what's here."

The trees suddenly stop dead as the group enters into a complete ring. The sole vegetation is the trimmed turf beneath the ground; it's obvious that it's naturally occurring, and appears that this unusual opening is wild, not the work of people.

The Blurred Line

This part of Romania is a place which stirs the imagination, where the border is indistinct between truth and myth. In countryside villages belief persists in strigoi ("screamers") – supernatural, shapeshifting vampires, who emerge from tombs to terrorise nearby villages.

Bram Stoker's famous vampire Count Dracula is always connected with Transylvania, and the historic stronghold – an ancient structure located on a cliff edge in the Transylvanian Alps – is actively advertised as "Dracula's Castle".

But including legend-filled Transylvania – truly, "the land past the woods" – seems tangible and comprehensible compared to these eerie woods, which seem to be, for causes related to radiation, environmental or entirely legendary, a hub for fantasy projection.

"Inside these woods," Marius states, "the boundary between reality and imagination is extremely fine."