🔗 Share this article

"People refer to this spot an enigmatic zone of Transylvania," remarks a tour guide, his exhalation creating puffs of condensation in the crisp night air. "Numerous people have disappeared here, it's thought it's a portal to a parallel world." Marius is leading a traveler on a night walk through what is often described as the world's most haunted forest: Hoia-Baciu, a section spanning 640 acres of old-growth local woods on the fringes of the metropolis of Cluj-Napoca.

Hundreds of Years of Enigma

Reports of unusual events here go back centuries – this woodland is named after a local shepherd who is said to have vanished in the distant past, together with his entire flock. But Hoia-Baciu came to worldwide fame in 1968, when an army specialist named Emil Barnea took a picture of what he described as a UFO suspended above a circular clearing in the centre of the forest.

Many came in here and vanished without trace. But don't worry," he continues, addressing the traveler with a grin. "Our tours have a flawless completion rate."

In the time after, Hoia-Baciu has brought in yogis, shamans, UFO researchers and ghost hunters from across the world, curious to experience the unusual forces believed to resonate through the forest.

Current Risks

Although it is one of the world's premier pilgrimage sites for supernatural fans, the grove is under threat. The western districts of Cluj-Napoca – an innovative digital cluster of more than 400,000 people, described as the innovation center of Eastern Europe – are advancing, and real estate firms are advocating for authorization to remove the forest to build apartment blocks.

Barring a limited section home to locally rare specific tree species, this woodland is lacking legal protection, but the guide hopes that the company he helped establish – a dedicated preservation group – will help to change that, persuading the government officials to appreciate the forest's value as a travel hotspot.

Spooky Experiences

While branches and seasonal debris snap and crunch beneath their boots, Marius recounts various traditional stories and reported supernatural events here.

• One famous story describes a young child disappearing during a group gathering, later to rematerialise half a decade later with no recollection of the events, showing no signs of aging a single day, her attire lacking the smallest trace of dust.
• Frequent accounts explain cellphones and photography gear mysteriously turning off on stepping into the forest.
• Feelings range from complete terror to feelings of joy.
• Certain individuals claim noticing bizarre skin irritations on their skin, hearing unseen murmurs through the forest, or feel fingers clutching them, even when sure they are alone.

Scientific Investigations

Despite several of the stories may be unverifiable, there is much before my eyes that is undeniably strange. Throughout the area are vegetation whose stems are bent and twisted into fantastical shapes.

Multiple explanations have been proposed to account for the misshapen plants: powerful storms could have bent the saplings, or typically increased electromagnetic fields in the ground account for their strange formation.

But research studies have found insufficient proof.

The Famous Clearing

The guide's excursions enable visitors to take part in a modest investigation of their own. Upon reaching the clearing in the forest where Barnea photographed his well-known UFO images, he passes his guest an EMF meter which detects energy patterns.

"We're venturing into the most active area of the forest," he says. "Try to detect something."

The trees suddenly stop dead as they step into a complete ring. The sole vegetation is the low vegetation beneath their shoes; it's clear that it's naturally occurring, and seems that this bizarre meadow is natural, not the creation of landscaping.

Fact Versus Fiction

This part of Romania is a location which stirs the imagination, where the division is blurred between fact and folklore. In countryside villages belief persists in strigoi ("screamers") – otherworldly, shapeshifting creatures, who rise from their graves to haunt nearby villages.

The famous author's well-known fictional vampire is permanently linked with Transylvania, and Bran Castle – a Saxon monolith perched on a cliff edge in the Transylvanian Alps – is actively advertised as "the vampire's home".

But even folklore-rich Transylvania – actually, "the territory after the grove" – feels tangible and comprehensible compared to these eerie woods, which appear to be, for reasons related to radiation, environmental or entirely legendary, a center for human imaginative power.

"In Hoia-Baciu," Marius states, "the division between fact and fiction is remarkably blurred."