🔗 Share this article

"Locals dub this spot a mysterious vortex of Transylvania," remarks a local guide, the air from his lungs forming puffs of mist in the cold night air. "So many visitors have vanished here, it's thought it's a portal to another dimension." Marius is escorting a traveler on a night walk through commonly known as the planet's most ghostly woodland: Hoia-Baciu, an area covering one square mile of old-growth indigenous forest on the outskirts of the metropolis of Cluj-Napoca.

Hundreds of Years of Enigma

Accounts of strange happenings here go back centuries – the forest is titled for a area shepherd who is said to have vanished in the far-off times, along with his entire flock. But Hoia-Baciu achieved global recognition in 1968, when a military technician called Emil Barnea took a picture of what he reported as a UFO suspended above a round opening in the heart of the forest.

Many came in here and vanished without trace. But don't worry," he continues, turning to the visitor with a smirk. "Our tours have a flawless completion rate."

In the time after, Hoia-Baciu has attracted yoga practitioners, shamans, ufologists and ghost hunters from across the world, curious to experience the mysterious powers reported to reverberate through the forest.

Modern Threats

Although it is among the planet's leading hotspots for lovers of the paranormal, the forest is under threat. The western districts of Cluj-Napoca – a contemporary technology center of over 400,000 residents, described as the innovation center of the region – are advancing, and real estate firms are campaigning for authorization to cut down the woods to construct residential buildings.

Aside from a limited section housing area-specific specific tree species, this woodland is not officially protected, but the guide hopes that the initiative he co-founded – a local conservation effort – will assist in altering this, encouraging the local administrators to acknowledge the forest's value as a visitor destination.

Spooky Experiences

While branches and fall foliage snap and crunch beneath their boots, the guide describes various folk tales and claimed paranormal happenings here.

• A popular tale recounts a young child disappearing during a family picnic, only to rematerialise half a decade later with complete amnesia of the events, without aging a single day, her clothes shy of the smallest trace of dirt.
• Frequent accounts detail mobile phones and imaging devices mysteriously turning off on entering the woods.
• Emotional responses vary from complete terror to states of ecstasy.
• Some people state noticing bizarre skin irritations on their skin, hearing ghostly voices through the forest, or sense fingers clutching them, although certain nobody is nearby.

Scientific Investigations

Despite several of the stories may be hard to prove, numerous elements clearly observable that is definitely bizarre. Everywhere you look are plants whose trunks are curved and contorted into bizarre configurations.

Different theories have been proposed to clarify the abnormal growth: powerful storms could have bent the saplings, or inherently elevated radioactivity in the ground cause their unusual development.

But scientific investigations have discovered no satisfactory evidence.

The Legendary Opening

The expert's excursions enable guests to engage in a modest investigation of their own. As we approach the meadow in the woods where Barnea captured his renowned UFO photographs, he passes the traveler an electromagnetic field detector which measures electromagnetic fields.

"We're entering the most energetic section of the forest," he comments. "Discover what's here."

The vegetation abruptly end as we emerge into a complete ring. The sole vegetation is the low vegetation beneath the ground; it's apparent that it's naturally occurring, and looks that this unusual opening is natural, not the work of people.

The Blurred Line

This part of Romania is a location which stirs the imagination, where the border is indistinct between truth and myth. In countryside villages faith continues in strigoi ("screamers") – supernatural, form-changing bloodsuckers, who emerge from tombs to terrorise nearby villages.

Bram Stoker's well-known character Dracula is permanently linked with Transylvania, and the historic stronghold – a Saxon monolith situated on a cliff edge in the Transylvanian Alps – is keenly marketed as "Dracula's Castle".

But even myth-shrouded Transylvania – literally, "the land past the woods" – seems real and understandable versus these eerie woods, which give the impression of being, for factors radioactive, atmospheric or entirely legendary, a center for human imaginative power.

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