"People refer to this location the Bermuda Triangle of Transylvania," remarks a local guide, his exhalation producing clouds of mist in the cold dusk atmosphere. "So many people have gone missing here, some say there's a gateway to another dimension." This expert is leading a guest on a nocturnal tour through what is often described as the world's most haunted forest: Hoia-Baciu, a square mile of primeval native woodland on the edges of the Transylvanian city of Cluj-Napoca.
Stories of bizarre occurrences here date back centuries – this woodland is named after a area shepherd who is said to have vanished in the distant past, accompanied by 200 of his sheep. But Hoia-Baciu achieved international attention in 1968, when a military technician named Emil Barnea captured on film what he reported as a unidentified flying object floating above a round opening in the centre of the forest.
Many came in here and failed to return. But no need to fear," he adds, addressing the traveler with a smile. "Our tours have a flawless completion rate."
In the time after, Hoia-Baciu has drawn yoga practitioners, traditional medicine people, ufologists and supernatural researchers from across the world, interested in encountering the strange energies said to echo through the forest.
Despite being a top global pilgrimage sites for lovers of the paranormal, this woodland is under threat. The western suburbs of Cluj-Napoca – an innovative digital cluster of over 400,000 residents, described as the Silicon Valley of Eastern Europe – are advancing, and construction companies are advocating for approval to cut down the woods to construct residential buildings.
Except for a few hectares home to regionally uncommon oak varieties, the grove is without conservation status, but Marius is confident that the organization he helped establish – a dedicated preservation group – will help to change that, motivating the authorities to appreciate the forest's value as a visitor destination.
While branches and fall foliage snap and crunch beneath their shoes, Marius describes some of the folk tales and reported supernatural events here.
Despite several of the tales may be impossible to confirm, numerous elements visibly present that is definitely bizarre. Throughout the area are trees whose bases are bent and twisted into bizarre configurations.
Multiple explanations have been proposed to clarify the deformed trees: strong gales could have bent the saplings, or inherently elevated radiation levels in the ground account for their unusual development.
But formal examinations have discovered inconclusive results.
The guide's excursions permit participants to take part in a modest investigation of their own. Upon reaching the clearing in the woods where Barnea captured his well-known UFO photographs, he hands his guest an EMF meter which measures EMF readings.
"We're entering the most active area of the forest," he states. "Discover what's here."
The trees abruptly end as we emerge into a complete ring. The only greenery is the low vegetation beneath the ground; it's obvious that it's naturally occurring, and appears that this bizarre meadow is natural, not the work of human hands.
The broader region is a area which stirs the imagination, where the line is indistinct between reality and legend. In countryside villages superstition remains in strigoi ("screamers") – otherworldly, form-changing vampires, who return from burial sites to terrorise local communities.
The novelist's well-known vampire Count Dracula is permanently linked with Transylvania, and the historic stronghold – an ancient structure located on a rocky outcrop in the mountain range – is keenly marketed as "the count's residence".
But even legend-filled Transylvania – actually, "the land past the woods" – appears solid and predictable versus the haunted grove, which seem to be, for causes nuclear, climatic or entirely legendary, a center for fantasy projection.
"In Hoia-Baciu," Marius says, "the division between fact and fiction is remarkably blurred."
