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"People refer to this location a mysterious vortex of Transylvania," explains a tour guide, the air from his lungs producing puffs of vapor in the cold evening air. "Numerous visitors have vanished here, many believe it's a portal to another dimension." This expert is escorting a traveler on a nocturnal tour through frequently labeled as the planet's most ghostly grove: Hoia-Baciu, a section spanning 640 acres of primeval indigenous forest on the fringes of the metropolis of Cluj-Napoca.

A Long History of the Unexplained

Accounts of strange happenings here date back centuries – the forest is called after a regional herder who is said to have vanished in the long ago, along with 200 of his sheep. But Hoia-Baciu achieved global recognition in 1968, when a military technician called Emil Barnea took a picture of what he claimed was a UFO suspended above a round opening in the middle of the forest.

Numerous entered this place and vanished without trace. But no need to fear," he states, facing the traveler with a smirk. "Our excursions have a 100% return rate."

In the decades since, Hoia-Baciu has drawn meditation experts, shamans, extraterrestrial investigators and supernatural researchers from worldwide, interested in encountering the strange energies reported to reverberate through the forest.

Current Risks

Despite being among the planet's leading hotspots for lovers of the paranormal, the grove is under threat. The western suburbs of Cluj-Napoca – an innovative digital cluster of more than 400,000 people, described as the tech capital of the region – are expanding, and developers are advocating for permission to cut down the woods to erect housing complexes.

Aside from a few hectares home to area-specific oak varieties, the grove is lacking legal protection, but Marius is confident that the initiative he co-founded – a dedicated preservation group – will assist in altering this, persuading the local administrators to acknowledge the forest's significance as a travel hotspot.

Spooky Experiences

While branches and autumn leaves snap and crunch beneath their shoes, the guide describes various local legends and reported ghostly incidents here.

• A popular tale describes a little girl vanishing during a group gathering, then to return half a decade later with no memory of what had happened, showing no signs of aging a day, her clothes shy of the smallest trace of soil.
• Regular stories explain smartphones and imaging devices mysteriously turning off on entering the woods.
• Reactions range from complete terror to states of ecstasy.
• Certain individuals report noticing unusual marks on their arms, detecting unseen murmurs through the trees, or feel fingers clutching them, even when certain nobody is nearby.

Research Efforts

Although numerous of the tales may be impossible to confirm, there is much before my eyes that is certainly unusual. Throughout the area are plants whose stems are bent and twisted into unusual forms.

Multiple explanations have been given to explain the misshapen plants: strong gales could have bent the saplings, or typically increased electromagnetic fields in the earth explain their strange formation.

But scientific investigations have turned up insufficient proof.

The Famous Clearing

Marius's walks allow visitors to take part in a modest investigation of their own. As we approach the opening in the woods where Barnea took his renowned UFO images, he hands the visitor an electromagnetic field detector which measures EMF readings.

"We're stepping into the most powerful part of the forest," he says. "Try to detect something."

The vegetation abruptly end as they step into a perfect circle. The sole vegetation is the short grass beneath their shoes; it's apparent that it's naturally occurring, and seems that this strange clearing is wild, not the work of human hands.

Fact Versus Fiction

This part of Romania is a place which fuels fantasy, where the border is blurred between truth and myth. In countryside villages belief persists in strigoi ("screamers") – supernatural, appearance-altering vampires, who return from burial sites to haunt nearby villages.

The famous author's well-known vampire Count Dracula is always connected with Transylvania, and Bran Castle – a Saxon monolith perched on a cliff edge in the Transylvanian Alps – is heavily promoted as "the vampire's home".

But including folklore-rich Transylvania – actually, "the place beyond the forest" – feels real and understandable compared to these eerie woods, which give the impression of being, for factors nuclear, atmospheric or entirely legendary, a center for human imaginative power.

"Inside these woods," the guide comments, "the line between fact and fiction is extremely fine."