You just ain't trying. To get to Forbidden woods you gotta get out of the Village location and go all the way to the left.
And to open the secret passage you need a crowbar which can be found in the Tavern's storage room.
Yea, except I didn't know I needed to use the hook blade on a stick to knock out the guy in front of the tavern. This is what I was trying to figure out & only found out through a lot of web searching.
