Enter Mexico's haunted 'Island of the Dolls' if you dare: Thousands of creepy toys hang from the trees to quell the tormented screams of a ghost of a little girl who drowned there<br />
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Hundreds of photographers and thrill-seekers travel to the haunted Island of the Dolls every year, but it was never meant to be a tourist attraction. After a two-hour canal ride from Mexico City, they arrive at a nightmarish clearing deep in the woods where thousands of mutilated dolls hang from the trees and hide among the dense branches.<br />
They were put there by a reclusive Mexican man who believed they would appease the troubled ghost of a small girl who died there over 50 years ago - and still haunts the woods today.<br />
Julian Santana Barrera retreated to the woods soon after she drowned in the nearby canal. He claimed he could hear her tormented screams and footsteps in the darkness.<br />
Even today - 14 years after his own mysterious death in those woods - visitors say they hear whispers in the night and feel the dolls' eyes following them through the trees.<br />
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Barrera found the girl's corpse floating in the canal and blamed himself for not being able to save her life, according to the so-called Isla de las Munecas' official website.<br />
He later discovered a doll floating in the same waters and, assuming it belonged to the deceased girl, hung it from a tree as a sign of respect. His descent into madness began with this seemingly innocent act. <br />
Barrera began to hear whispers, footsteps and the anguished wails of a woman in the darkness even though his hut - hidden deep inside the woods of Xochimilco - was miles away from civilisation.<br />
Driven by fear, he hung the dismembered toys from the trees to protect himself from her ghost and spent the next 50 years 'decorating' the woods in a desperate attempt to appease her.<br />
He hung hundreds of toys - some missing body parts - from the trees and the wire fencing which surrounded his wooden shack.<br />
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Barrera lived a hermit's life in those woods until 2001 wh