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"They call this place the Bermuda Triangle of Transylvania," remarks an experienced guide, his breath forming wisps of condensation in the cold dusk atmosphere. "So many people have gone missing here, many believe it's an entrance to another dimension." This expert is leading a guest on a evening stroll through commonly known as the globe's spookiest grove: Hoia-Baciu, an area covering one square mile of primeval local woods on the fringes of the metropolis of Cluj-Napoca.

Hundreds of Years of Enigma

Reports of strange happenings here go back centuries – the forest is named after a local shepherd who is believed to have disappeared in the distant past, accompanied by two hundred animals. But Hoia-Baciu came to international attention in 1968, when a defense worker known as Emil Barnea photographed what he reported as a UFO floating above a round opening in the middle of the forest.

Many came in here and never came out. But don't worry," he continues, turning to his guest with a smirk. "Our excursions have a perfect safety record."

In the years that followed, Hoia-Baciu has drawn meditation experts, traditional medicine people, extraterrestrial investigators and paranormal investigators from worldwide, eager to feel the mysterious powers believed to resonate through the forest.

Current Risks

It may be among the planet's leading pilgrimage sites for paranormal enthusiasts, this woodland is at risk. The western suburbs of Cluj-Napoca – a modern tech hub of more than 400,000 people, called the innovation center of eastern Europe – are advancing, and construction companies are advocating for permission to cut down the woods to build apartment blocks.

Aside from a limited section housing area-specific specific tree species, the forest is lacking legal protection, but the guide hopes that the initiative he helped establish – a local conservation effort – will assist in altering this, motivating the local administrators to acknowledge the forest's value as a visitor destination.

Chilling Events

As twigs and seasonal debris split and rustle beneath their footwear, the guide recounts numerous folk tales and reported paranormal happenings here.

• A well-known account describes a little girl going missing during a family picnic, then to reappear five years later with no recollection of what had happened, without aging a day, her garments lacking the smallest trace of soil.
• Regular stories describe cellphones and camera equipment mysteriously turning off on stepping into the forest.
• Emotional responses include full-blown dread to feelings of joy.
• Certain individuals claim observing strange rashes on their arms, hearing disembodied whispers through the trees, or experience palms pushing them, even when convinced they're by themselves.

Scientific Investigations

While many of the accounts may be impossible to confirm, numerous elements clearly observable that is undeniably strange. Everywhere you look are trees whose bases are curved and contorted into bizarre configurations.

Various suggestions have been proposed to account for the misshapen plants: strong gales could have shaped the young trees, or inherently elevated electromagnetic fields in the ground account for their strange formation.

But research studies have turned up no satisfactory evidence.

The Legendary Opening

The expert's tours enable guests to take part in a small-scale research of their own. Upon reaching the clearing in the trees where Barnea photographed his famous UFO photographs, he hands his guest an electromagnetic field detector which measures EMF readings.

"We're entering the most energetic area of the forest," he states. "See what you can find."

The trees immediately cease as the group enters into a flawless round. The sole vegetation is the trimmed turf beneath their shoes; it's clear that it hasn't been mown, and seems that this strange clearing is wild, not the creation of human hands.

The Blurred Line

The broader region is a area which fuels fantasy, where the line is indistinct between truth and myth. In countryside villages superstition remains in strigoi ("screamers") – otherworldly, shapeshifting vampires, who emerge from tombs to terrorise regional populations.

Bram Stoker's well-known vampire Count Dracula is permanently linked with Transylvania, and the legendary fortress – a Saxon monolith situated on a stone formation in the Carpathian Mountains – is heavily promoted as "the vampire's home".

But including folklore-rich Transylvania – actually, "the land past the woods" – seems solid and predictable versus the haunted grove, which give the impression of being, for causes nuclear, environmental or entirely legendary, a nexus for human imaginative power.

"Inside these woods," Marius comments, "the line between reality and imagination is extremely fine."