Playground Photo

Marian wrote:I've just noticed something else in the photo. In some copies of it there's what looks like a young boy on the far left in front of a push chair. However when you enlarge the photo to 400% you'll see that it's an adult (not sure if male or female) carrying a small child. This version of the photo can be seen on [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

The child is looking straight ahead and the adult has his or her right arm up - probably as protection against the sun. I wonder if that person was ever traced and interviewed.

Thanks for a much better copy! I think it looks more like a young woman in shorts. The legs have a certain femininity and you can see her dark hair behind the boy's head. Also I think that the bottom is a little more rounded than a boy. Still, I don't expect that whoever it was, can remember anything.
Thanks to this print, I'm now sure that Madeleine is the one shopped in. She's no more than a foot away from Gerry and if she unfolded herself, she'd be almost as tall as he. The more you blow it up the clearer it is. I think the giveaway must be where her left foot meets the grass. I'd need more magnification, but the grass is more of less a horizontal set of pixels there. The composition suddenly makes sense if you take Madeleine away.
Others have commented on a man hiding behind the house, but now I see straight through it and see a couple sitting on the veranda of the hut?

Now, she is definitely wearing the trainers that the cleaner commented on. Still beats me why they weren't available for DNA testing and why Kate has never mentioned them, we got most of the rest of the pink wardrobe, and those were pink lights along the sole.

The playground photo seems to change a little every time I see it - okay, maybe that's just me. I've seen the extended version before and always thought it was a boy on the far left but there's no doubt that it is an older person (probably female) holding a child. I'm sure it's my imagination in thinking there's a resemblance between that child and the one mistaken for Madeleine in Morocco.

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Try as I might I can't see a couple or anyone else behind the house. Are we talking about the thing (can't think how to describe it!) with green steps in front of and to the right of the girl in the striped jumper?

Jean wrote:The playground photo seems to change a little every time I see it - okay, maybe that's just me. I've seen the extended version before and always thought it was a boy on the far left but there's no doubt that it is an older person (probably female) holding a child. I'm sure it's my imagination in thinking there's a resemblance between that child and the one mistaken for Madeleine in Morocco.

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Try as I might I can't see a couple or anyone else behind the house. Are we talking about the thing (can't think how to describe it!) with green steps in front of and to the right of the girl in the striped jumper?

Yes, the green steps, just above that is an oval gap, in that gap you can just see a person probably near the hut or on the steps of the hut. Lilac dress or top and sunglasses are clearly visible. But only if you blow it up. Now in this gap people have been seeing a man, hiding behind the plastic house.
I could never make that out, but this is the first time I've seen that woman in lilac with the sunglasses. Perfectly innocent of course, it could even be Jane T. as it is probably Ella sitting on the ground with Sean. Wonder where Amelie was?

Yes I imagine that I cannot enlarge the image sufficiently to see whoever was behind the house. It has been ascertained that the other child is the elder of the Payne daughters. She is also the one climbing the airport steps with Madeleine and the Paynes were the only Tapas 7 members who flew with the McCanns.

tigger wrote:

Jean wrote:The playground photo seems to change a little every time I see it - okay, maybe that's just me. I've seen the extended version before and always thought it was a boy on the far left but there's no doubt that it is an older person (probably female) holding a child. I'm sure it's my imagination in thinking there's a resemblance between that child and the one mistaken for Madeleine in Morocco.

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Try as I might I can't see a couple or anyone else behind the house. Are we talking about the thing (can't think how to describe it!) with green steps in front of and to the right of the girl in the striped jumper?

Yes, the green steps, just above that is an oval gap, in that gap you can just see a person probably near the hut or on the steps of the hut. Lilac dress or top and sunglasses are clearly visible. But only if you blow it up. Now in this gap people have been seeing a man, hiding behind the plastic house.
I could never make that out, but this is the first time I've seen that woman in lilac with the sunglasses. Perfectly innocent of course, it could even be Jane T. as it is probably Ella sitting on the ground with Sean. Wonder where Amelie was?

on my screen, the whole playhouse with green steps, yellow slide, slide behind the steps, weird orange cut off object on the left-side, fire hose?, is wrong, and more especially the "picture" of the lady in lilac just doesn´t fit in when compared to the architecture of the hut behind it, the hut is I think one storey high, there are two windows at approx. eye-level so where would the lady be sitting?

Invinoveritas wrote:[


on my screen, the whole playhouse with green steps, yellow slide, slide behind the steps, weird orange cut off object on the left-side, fire hose?, is wrong, and more especially the "picture" of the lady in lilac just doesn´t fit in when compared to the architecture of the hut behind it, the hut is I think one storey high, there are two windows at approx. eye-level so where would the lady be sitting?

Yes, I had trouble working that out. Perhaps there's a sort of veranda? Can't see any reason to add that, otherwise the whole play house must have been moved. Then we still have the problem of the fat man with the ballet dancer turn-out. That could be explained it his upper body came with the playhouse and was glued onto an existing leg.
I measured the pink girl - about 3.5 units (one unit being her lower leg) .She can only be about a foot or foot and a half away from Gerry and straightened out, she would be taller than he is in this stance. Too tall for a toddler. Same girl coming out of the playhouse in another photo is measured by the door to be about 93 cm I think.That one I definitely don't think is Maddie, don't think this one is either.

According to the Pamalam site it's claimed that this image in the playground was taken at 17.15 on 2nd May.

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Presumably all the others were taken on the same day at around the same time. Could someone please check in Kate's novel as to what she says that the family was doing then?

I am just trying to work out the shadows, assuming that the sun is approx. somewhere between south-west and west south west and is in the month of may and that there is a high zoom factor in the photo then this could explain the differences in size of the individuals, what it doesn´t explain is the lack of shadowing to the right of the playhouse, the size of the lilac woman and the background colour involved here with the colour of the hut wall as a comparison, also there doesn´t appear to be a connection between the strap and the satchel on the ballet-dancer, just confused!

P.S. we don´t have a playhouse

I've found the playground from another viewpoint which might help clarify things.. looks like the building does have a small verandah.
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Invinoveritas wrote:I am just trying to work out the shadows, assuming that the sun is approx. somewhere between south-west and west south west and is in the month of may and that there is a high zoom factor in the photo then this could explain the differences in size of the individuals, what it doesn´t explain is the lack of shadowing to the right of the playhouse, the size of the lilac woman and the background colour involved here with the colour of the hut wall as a comparison, also there doesn´t appear to be a connection between the strap and the satchel on the ballet-dancer, just confused!

P.S. we don´t have a playhouse

Yes, I noticed no shadow next to the play house, don't know. The satchel is easy though, the man is wearing a grey jacket tied around his hips and on top of that a black scarf, slightly bulky, also tied around him but looped through the strap.
Sean is sitting on his knees,playing with a hat? and Gerry is looking at him. Sean doesn't look too big to me.
I can see at just over 400x blurring under the pink elbow and on top of the shoulder.The grass seems rather straight in front of her left shoe. I still think she must be shopped in, remove her and at least most of the picture makes sense.
I'm even more sure it's a woman in a brown top and shorts, carrying a child on the far left. She has dark hair and is wearing sunglasses. I can see a definite breast shape at that magnification.

my thanks to Jean,Stewie and Tigger for helping to clear up the confusion in my head,[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

snip:I'm even more sure it's a woman in a brown top and shorts, carrying a child on the far left. She has dark hair and is wearing sunglasses. I can see a definite breast shape at that magnification.

Yes I agree with you here, also the rounded buttocks suggest a femine figure.

I found this picture on the PJ Files taken on May 2th at 17.15

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and also this one with Amelie´s backside in the playhouse

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Jean wrote:According to the Pamalam site it's claimed that this image in the playground was taken at 17.15 on 2nd May.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Presumably all the others were taken on the same day at around the same time. Could someone please check in Kate's novel as to what she says that the family was doing then?

It will be interesting to see what Kate claims they were all doing when these photos were supposedly taken.

Sorry to be indelicate Invinoveritas but how do you know whose backside is in the picture?!



P.S Thank you Invinoveritas, I didn't mean to doubt you!

Marian wrote:

Jean wrote:According to the Pamalam site it's claimed that this image in the playground was taken at 17.15 on 2nd May.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Presumably all the others were taken on the same day at around the same time. Could someone please check in Kate's novel as to what she says that the family was doing then?

It will be interesting to see what Kate claims they were all doing when these photos were supposedly taken.

Sorry to be indelicate Invinoveritas but how do you know whose backside is in the picture?!

I assumed that the PJFiles would be correct?: Page 587 Amelie's backside in playhouse, maroon top and pink-white dacks, 587a 599c MBM

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Invinoveritas wrote:my thanks to Jean,Stewie and Tigger for helping to clear up the confusion in my head,[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

snip:I'm even more sure it's a woman in a brown top and shorts, carrying a child on the far left. She has dark hair and is wearing sunglasses. I can see a definite breast shape at that magnification.

Yes I agree with you here, also the rounded buttocks suggest a femine figure.

I found this picture on the PJ Files taken on May 2th at 17.15

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and also this one with Amelie´s backside in the playhouse

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From the clothes it looks like the picture are taken as the same day as they arrive. MAdeleine, Tanner kid Sean and Gerry are all wearing the same clothes as on the airbus vid , BUT if its Amelie as the PJ files states in the background in the playhouse picture, well why does she not wear the same clothes as on the airbus vid? And I guess Mccann has confirmed that it is her since they state that? And she has not only changed her trouser ( she could have got a wet diper) but the jacket is different from the airbus aswell. Strange thing.

Marian wrote:

Jean wrote:According to the Pamalam site it's claimed that this image in the playground was taken at 17.15 on 2nd May.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Presumably all the others were taken on the same day at around the same time. Could someone please check in Kate's novel as to what she says that the family was doing then?

It will be interesting to see what Kate claims they were all doing when these photos were supposedly taken.

Sorry to be indelicate Invinoveritas but how do you know whose backside is in the picture?!



P.S Thank you Invinoveritas, I didn't mean to doubt you!

Sorry if I appeared to be a bit short with you, it wasn´t intended[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.] , I suffer from a COPD and the weather in this part of the world is hot ATM so I have to save my energy a bit.

By Dr Martin Roberts
05 August 2011

THIRTY DAYS

Thirty days hath September, April, June and November. The rest have thirty-one (except for May which, in 2007, was short by one Wednesday).

"Wednesday, 2 May, 2007. Our last completely happy day. Our last, to date, as a family of five." (Kate McCann in 'Madeleine' p.59).

Ripe for recollection, this particular Wednesday in May ought to feature conspicuously in the McCanns' various accounts of the truth, yet it does not; even in Kate McCann's recently published attempt at putting the record straight. Although the nocturnal shenanigans are ritually described, references to the diurnal aspect of that 'last completely happy (family) day' are conspicuous only by their near absence. The sentence quoted above is followed by two short paragraphs. And that's it. Heralded as a major event, Wednesday 2 May proves, in fact, to be something of a non-event.

O.K., so it rained. It's still possible to have family fun indoors, even in a small holiday apartment. Unless of course you are desperate to off-load the children so you can show off your new pink trainers down at the beach again with Matt, running the gauntlet of small dogs. That must have been a long run, taking up most of the morning, as the next thing that happens is "Gerry and I picked up the children, had lunch in the apartment and then took them to the play area for an hour before walking them to their clubs." (p.60). Tennis was rescheduled. "After that it was the usual routine: tea with the children, playtime, bath time, milk, stories, kids' bedtime, get ready, Tapas at 8.30 p.m."

And that, dear reader, is the extent of the family experience on Wednesday 2 May.

Some might consider an interval of several years adequate justification for poor recall, but such justification cannot apply to an interval of only one week! Here's what Gerry McCann had to say to Portuguese investigators on 10 May, 2007. Notice how Wednesday daytime fails to merit a mention:

"Concerning the routine, on Tuesday there was a slight change given that after lunch, at 13H30, the deponent and KATE decided to take the three children to Praia da Luz, having gone on foot, taking only the twins in baby buggies. They all left by the main door because of the buggies, went around to the right, down the street of the "BATISTA" supermarket and went to the beach along a road directly ahead.

"They were at the beach for about 20 minutes...

"On the day that MADELEINE disappeared, Thursday, 3 May 2007, they all woke up at the same time, between 07H30 and 08H00. When they were having breakfast, MADELEINE addressed her mother and asked her "why didn't you come last night when SEAN and I were crying?"

"On Wednesday night, 2 May 2007, apart from the deponent and his wife, he thinks that DAVID PAYNE also went to his apartment to check that his children were well, not having reported to him any abnormal situation with the children...

"He cannot say exactly, but he thinks that on Monday or Tuesday MADELEINE had slept for some time in his bedroom, with KATE, as she had told him that one or both twins were crying, making much noise.

"Back to Thursday..."

Back to Thursday. Without ever having visited Wednesday, either on the 10th or the week previously (the 4th), although Kate manages to mention it, just, during her earliest interview:

"Apart from that, on Wednesday or Thursday, Madeleine and the other children went sailing at the beach, five minutes away from the club, for an hour, in an event that was organised by the resort. The surveillance of this activity and the organisation were done by the club, and the deponent was not present, nor was her husband."

Not only are Wednesday and Thursday evidently interchangeable but, in terms of Madeleine's known whereabouts, that was a matter for resort staff, as neither Kate nor Gerry was present during the organised activity. (Gerry makes a comparable observation in his own 4 May statement).

The McCanns' 'last completely happy day' appears to have been dropped from the calendar, whilst confirmation of Madeleine's presence rests squarely with Mark Warner nannies. There are the creche registers of course (well, they exist at least), and the occasional 'sightings' by third parties.

According to Nanny Cat Baker's 10 May responses to Portuguese police inquiries, Madeleine should have been with her at the beach on Tuesday, Wednesday [15.30 - 16.30] AND Thursday [10.00 - 11.00] when she had a boat trip - at the same time as Jane Tanner is supposed, by Rachael Oldfield, to have taken her photograph while engaged in mini-tennis - which she did not do according to Russell O'Brien.

But we are more concerned with the Wednesday. As was Dianne Webster:

4078 "When was the last time you saw Madeleine?"
Reply "(Sighs) You see I don't remember seeing her on the Thursday because I didn't go to the high tea, err but I was apparently in the play area afterwards but I can't recall that."
4078 "Okay."
Reply "Err so from what I can recall, the last time I would have seen Madeleine would have been the Wednesday at the high tea probably."

Use of the conditional + 'probably' does not mean it happened. For all we know the witness may even have partaken of 'probably the best lager in the world' (instead of high tea).

As far as the McCanns were concerned, May 2007 consisted of thirty recorded days. But surely even two paragraphs from Kate justify recognising the full thirty-one? Well, if you insist. But, in terms of diurnal activity, the result is the same. Monday isn't accounted for either - neither in their statements, nor the book.

Between two deleted days therefore we have a duplicate visit to the beach and, from Wednesday evening through Thursday, a succession of questionable 'checks' and 'sightings.' It's just as well we have the handful of photographs taken in Praia da Luz, including the 'last' one, or we might be tempted to question whether Madeleine was seen at all that week by anyone except her parents.

So this doesn't fit either. The photograph must have been taken just after lunch and before delivering them to the creche, according to Kate, who doesn't mention taking any photographs.
I think I'm right, and if the camera is right on the time, that wasn't Maddie.
Lunch would be finished by 2.00? One hour's play (although I don't really believe that, seeing the trip to the beach and the ice cream story) and back at the creche by 3.00 p.m. That's over two hours later and how does that fit in with the shadows? Shouldn't they be longer by that time?

Hi Marian, the photograph link you sent me earlier has a lot of photographs of Maddie where IMO she doesn't look at all well. I'm so convinced that there was something wrong with her.

So it looks as if the playground photos were taken on both 28th April and 2nd May! Moa, it's the Paynes' elder daughter with her back to the camera. Here's a link to confirm that it was her family which travelled with the McCanns.

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I don't know if it means anything but in the images where Madeleine is clmbing the steps, she has full length trousers but, when she's sitting in the bus, they are knee length. They could have been turned up but to me they look a bit narrow when full length to be able to do that.

I was under the impression that the camera hadn´t been programmed with date/time/year, I think I read that in the PJFiles, I´ll have a look, interestingly I was googling for a weather archive from May 2007 for Portugal and decided to see what google earth has on offer,using the sliders for time and sun I got a pretty accurate result, the sun appears to start going down at about 20.00 british summertime ditto for portugal, the lenght of the shadows could be about right for 17.15, I think shadows are shorter the nearer one is to the equator, the play area faces SSE., so turning the play area to south I get shadows that are roughly Easterly or perhaps slightly North of East

Invinoveritas wrote:I was under the impression that the camera hadn´t been programmed with date/time/year, I think I read that in the PJFiles, I´ll have a look, interestingly I was googling for a weather archive from May 2007 for Portugal and decided to see what google earth has on offer,using the sliders for time and sun I got a pretty accurate result, the sun appears to start going down at about 20.00 british summertime ditto for portugal, the lenght of the shadows could be about right for 17.15, I think shadows are shorter the nearer one is to the equator, the play area faces SSE., so turning the play area to south I get shadows that are roughly Easterly or perhaps slightly North of East

I think the pool picture had a date/time on it. But time was either 1.29 or 2.29. I think 1.29, which doesn't work with what Kate said.
Time zone in Portugal is the same as UK. Anyway that one had a date/time on it so the rest would too. I think it's one of the things they overlooked. didn't expect the PJ to check that.
Date/time can be changed in any case, whether this will be evident in the software, I don't know.

I´ll just post this link, perhaps you can make more out of it than I have, will be logging off now, take care

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Invinoveritas wrote:I´ll just post this link, perhaps you can make more out of it than I have, will be logging off now, take care

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Very good! this means that the dated photograph cannot be from that period. Gerry had to go back to the UK to produce it (3 weeks after 3/5)
definitely photoshopped, most obvious is Amelie's missing right arm, the fact that the flowers behind them don't blossom in April and the weird reflection in Gerry's sunglasses.
There is a date and time on this photo and none of the others. Therefore, not taken on that camera at that time.
Maddie looks about 3 yrs old in there anyway. Too short and too young.

Have a good rest, this is taxing!

People who have studied the playhouse picture say it's photoshopped.

IIR what was said, the child's hand is strangely blurred, there's a yellow patch on the door that doesn't make sense, and the door has brown bits that don't fit that playhouse style (apparently it's a common model).

There was more but I can't remember it.

I think the orange round thing on the playhouse is meant to be a steering wheel of some kind - that the children would pretend to be driving a house!

Jean wrote:So it looks as if the playground photos were taken on both 28th April and 2nd May! Moa, it's the Paynes' elder daughter with her back to the camera. Here's a link to confirm that it was her family which travelled with the McCanns.

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I don't know if it means anything but in the images where Madeleine is clmbing the steps, she has full length trousers but, when she's sitting in the bus, they are knee length. They could have been turned up but to me they look a bit narrow when full length to be able to do that.

I agree that the trousers seem to be different lengths and look at them in the full length photo number 14. They're long enough to cover her shoes partly which they certainly are not in the climbing the steps images.

This is all so weird!