🔗 Share this article

"Locals dub this place an enigmatic zone of Transylvania," remarks a local guide, the air from his lungs forming wisps of condensation in the crisp evening air. "So many people have gone missing here, many believe it's a portal to another dimension." The guide is leading a traveler on a night walk through frequently labeled as the globe's spookiest forest: Hoia-Baciu, an area covering one square mile of ancient local woods on the fringes of the Romanian city of Cluj-Napoca.

Centuries of Mystery

Accounts of unusual events here go back a long time – the grove is named after a area shepherd who is believed to have disappeared in the far-off times, together with 200 of his sheep. But Hoia-Baciu gained worldwide fame in 1968, when an army specialist known as Emil Barnea captured on film what he claimed was a flying saucer floating above a round opening in the centre of the forest.

Countless ventured inside and never came out. But don't worry," he states, addressing the traveler with a grin. "Our guided walks have a 100% return rate."

In the decades since, Hoia-Baciu has brought in yoga practitioners, shamans, extraterrestrial investigators and supernatural researchers from worldwide, curious to experience the strange energies reported to reverberate through the forest.

Modern Threats

Despite being a top global hotspots for lovers of the paranormal, the forest is facing danger. The western districts of Cluj-Napoca – a modern tech hub of a population exceeding 400,000, described as the innovation center of eastern Europe – are encroaching, and real estate firms are campaigning for approval to remove the forest to build apartment blocks.

Aside from a small area home to locally rare Mediterranean oak trees, this woodland is not officially protected, but the guide hopes that the organization he co-founded – a dedicated preservation group – will help to change that, persuading the government officials to acknowledge the forest's importance as a tourist attraction.

Eerie Encounters

While branches and autumn leaves snap and crunch beneath their boots, the guide describes some of the traditional stories and claimed paranormal happenings here.

• One famous story tells of a young child going missing during a family picnic, only to reappear half a decade later with no memory of the events, showing no signs of aging a day, her attire shy of the slightest speck of soil.
• More common reports explain mobile phones and imaging devices unexpectedly failing on venturing inside.
• Emotional responses vary from complete terror to moments of euphoria.
• Certain individuals state observing bizarre skin irritations on their bodies, detecting unseen murmurs through the woodland, or experience hands grabbing them, even when convinced they're by themselves.

Research Efforts

Although numerous of the accounts may be unverifiable, there are many things before my eyes that is definitely bizarre. All around are plants whose bases are curved and contorted into unusual forms.

Various suggestions have been given to explain the misshapen plants: that hurricane winds could have bent the saplings, or inherently elevated radiation levels in the ground account for their unusual development.

But scientific investigations have found inconclusive results.

The Famous Clearing

The guide's excursions permit visitors to participate in a modest investigation of their own. Upon reaching the meadow in the trees where Barnea photographed his renowned UFO images, he hands the traveler an ghost-hunting device which measures energy patterns.

"We're entering the most active part of the forest," he says. "Try to detect something."

The trees suddenly stop dead as the group enters into a complete ring. The sole vegetation is the low vegetation beneath our feet; it's apparent that it's not maintained, and appears that this unusual opening is organic, not the result of human hands.

Fact Versus Fiction

Transylvania generally is a area which fuels fantasy, where the border is blurred between fact and folklore. In countryside villages belief persists in strigoi ("screamers") – supernatural, form-changing vampires, who rise from their graves to frighten local communities.

The famous author's renowned fictional vampire is always connected with Transylvania, and the legendary fortress – an ancient structure located on a stone formation in the mountain range – is heavily promoted as "Dracula's Castle".

But even folklore-rich Transylvania – actually, "the land past the woods" – feels solid and predictable in contrast to these eerie woods, which seem to be, for factors nuclear, climatic or purely mythical, a hub for fantasy projection.

"In Hoia-Baciu," the guide says, "the division between truth and fantasy is extremely fine."