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"Locals dub this place an enigmatic zone of Transylvania," states an experienced guide, his breath creating puffs of mist in the crisp evening air. "Numerous individuals have disappeared here, many believe there's a gateway to a different realm." This expert is leading a visitor on a night walk through what is often described as the world's most haunted woodland: Hoia-Baciu, an area covering one square mile of primeval native woodland on the outskirts of the Romanian city of Cluj-Napoca.

Centuries of Mystery

Reports of bizarre occurrences here extend back a long time – this woodland is named after a regional herder who is said to have vanished in the far-off times, together 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 described as a UFO floating above a oval meadow in the centre of the forest.

Many came in here and never came out. But don't worry," he adds, addressing his guest with a grin. "Our tours have a flawless completion rate."

In the decades since, Hoia-Baciu has attracted yogis, spiritual healers, UFO researchers and supernatural researchers from worldwide, eager to feel the strange energies reported to reverberate through the forest.

Contemporary Dangers

Despite being a top global pilgrimage sites for lovers of the paranormal, the forest is at risk. The western suburbs of Cluj-Napoca – an innovative digital cluster of more than 400,000 people, known as the tech capital of the region – are encroaching, and real estate firms are pushing for approval to cut down the woods to construct residential buildings.

Except for a small area home to area-specific oak varieties, the grove is lacking legal protection, but Marius hopes that the company he was instrumental in creating – a local conservation effort – will help to change that, persuading the government officials to acknowledge the forest's value as a travel hotspot.

Eerie Encounters

As twigs and seasonal debris split and rustle beneath their footwear, the guide describes various local legends and alleged ghostly incidents here.

• A well-known account recounts a little girl disappearing during a group gathering, only to return after five years with no memory of her experience, showing no signs of aging a moment, her clothes without the slightest speck of dust.
• Regular stories explain cellphones and imaging devices mysteriously turning off on venturing inside.
• Feelings range from full-blown dread to states of ecstasy.
• Certain individuals claim observing strange rashes on their skin, perceiving ghostly voices through the trees, or experience fingers clutching them, despite being certain nobody is nearby.

Research Efforts

While many of the accounts may be impossible to confirm, numerous elements clearly observable that is certainly unusual. Everywhere you look are trees whose trunks are bent and twisted into fantastical shapes.

Multiple explanations have been given to explain the deformed trees: strong gales could have altered the growth, or naturally high radiation levels in the earth explain their crooked growth.

But formal examinations have found no satisfactory evidence.

The Famous Clearing

The guide's excursions allow visitors to take part in a small-scale research of their own. As we approach the meadow in the trees where Barnea captured his well-known UFO photographs, he hands his guest an ghost-hunting device which registers electromagnetic fields.

"We're entering the most energetic area of the forest," he comments. "Try to detect something."

The plants abruptly end as the group enters into a flawless round. The single plant life is the short grass beneath our feet; it's obvious that it's naturally occurring, and looks that this bizarre meadow is organic, not the result of landscaping.

The Blurred Line

This part of Romania is a area which stirs the imagination, where the border is unclear between fact and folklore. In rural Romanian communities superstition remains in strigoi ("screamers") – undead, shapeshifting creatures, who emerge from tombs to haunt local communities.

The famous author's well-known vampire Count Dracula is forever associated with Transylvania, and the legendary fortress – a Saxon monolith situated on a rocky outcrop in the Transylvanian Alps – is heavily promoted as "the vampire's home".

But including myth-shrouded Transylvania – actually, "the land past the woods" – appears solid and predictable compared to the haunted grove, which seem to be, for reasons related to radiation, climatic or entirely legendary, a hub for fantasy projection.

"Within this forest," Marius comments, "the boundary between fact and fiction is remarkably blurred."