El Rocio is a village of two faces. For most of the year it is almost eerily quiet — sandy lanes, wooden boardwalks, and a scattering of whitewashed hermandad (brotherhood) houses empty of their owners. Then Pentecost arrives and a million pilgrims descend. Whether you visit in the hush of an ordinary week or during the madness of the romeria, the setting beside the Doñana marshes is extraordinary.