Two golfing trips

by **Tony Bennett** 07.08.12 22:04

tigger wrote:According to Kate, Gerry had been to Portugal before - I believe it was PdL or that area...

From Dr Kate McCann's 'madeleine', page 42 [hardback version]:

"It was on New Year's Day 2007 that the idea of a spring holiday in Portugal was first raised. Fiona and David Payne, who had come with their children Lily and Scarlet to spend the day with us, were planning a week's break at a Mark Warner resort in the Algarve, probably with two other couples and their families, and they asked us if we'd like to join them. We'd been away with Fiona and David on several occasions and we'd always enjoyed ourselves...

"The other couples pencilled in for this trip were Russell O'Brien and Jane Tanner and Matt and Rachael Oldield...

"I'd never been to Portugal, although Gerry had been there on a couple of golfing trips a few years before..."

So: twice before. For golf. No destination stated.

by Guest 07.08.12 23:42

Indeed, a couple = a minimum of two [but could be more]. And there's quite some golf course about in the Algarve, be they existing or newly constructed ...

by **tigger** 08.08.12 6:06

Châtelaine wrote:Indeed, a couple = a minimum of two [but could be more]. And there's quite some golf course about in the Algarve, be they existing or newly constructed ...

No less than four near PdL I understand, yet strangely, golf isn't mentioned by the McCanns in connection with the holiday. Never. There were no golf bags no tennis bags, indeed, no golfing partners. Which is a shame, because after 3/5 golfing partners were everywhere.
Would be really interesting to know who was partnering Gerry on his previous golfing trips. It is also strange that during their four month stay Gerry played no golf at all, I don't believe that the presence of journalists would have been a problem, they were well under control by then.
I believe that in November a meeting with Murat was also at a golf club? Or am I wrong here Tony?

I also seem to remember that Gerry had his golf clubs and bag stolen from his car in Rothley some time before the holiday. Damn unlucky that man!

by **Tony Bennett** 08.08.12 6:58

tigger wrote:I believe that in November a meeting with Murat was also at a golf club? Or am I wrong here Tony?

No, I don't think that's correct.

Let's just go over the November Murat meeting:

This was in the house of Ralph and Sally Eveleigh, Murat's aunt and uncle. It was on 13 November 2007. Also present were:

* Robert Murat's mother

* Robert Murat

* Robert Murat's lawyer, Francisco Pagarete

* Brian Kennedy

* Brian Kennedy's in-house lawyer at his Latium Group, Senior Freemason and holidaymaker in P:raia da Luz every year since 1999, Edward Smethurst.

Earlier that day, Brian Kennedy had attended another meeting, at Portimao Police Station, with two or three Police Officers, and flanked by:

Francisco Marco, boss of the shady Metodo 3 Spanish detective agency, who boasted a month later that his men 'knew where Madeleine was', were 'closing in on her kidnappers', and that 'Madelemne would be home by Christmas', and

Antonio Giminez Raso, Metodo 3's 'top' detective', who was assigned to be the main Metodo 3 private detective working on the Madeleine McCann case, and who was involved in the promotion of numerous 'sightings' of and newspaper stories about Madeleine. He has since been exposed as a corrupt former senior police officer who has been in prison since being remanded in custody in February 2009, charged with aiding and abetting the theft of £25 million of cocaine from a boat in Barcelona harbour, and being a key member of a 27-strong vicious criminal gang (see elsewhere on this forum).

The only meeting I am aware of that Murat had with anyone was on the afternoon of 3 May 2007.

Here once again [extracted from my long article re Murat] is the list of 17 lies that Murat originally told police when pulled in for questioning on 14 May 2007. He dramatically changed his story (after being confronted with mobile 'phone evidence that proved he had lied) when re-interviewed on 10 and 11 July 2007:

SECTION I. A summary of Murat’s 17 changes of story about what he did on 1, 2, 3 and 4 May

You may by now have lost count of the number of changes in Robert Murat’s story about what he was doing between 1 and 4 May, so here’s a convenient summary of his new account of events, and how these contradicted his earlier account of events:

1. Remembers that on 1 May he tried to contact Jorge da Silva.

2. Remembers that on 2 May he didn’t leave home at 10.30am but instead had a meeting with Sergei Malinka at the Batista Supermarket.

3. He had in fact taken Michaela and Malinka back to his mother’s house in Praia da Luz for a further discussion, something he’d omitted to tell the police in the first interview.

4. He now remembered visiting his bank and paying in 287.51 euros.

5. He now remembered he’d called at the home of Francisco Pagarete, his lawyer, that morning.

6. He now remembers that he had met Francisco Pagarete that afternoon.

7. He now remembers that another of Jorge’s sons was present at their meeting in the café in the afternoon.

8. The meeting in the café went on much longer than he had said previously.

9. He thinks that Michaela Walczuk’s husband Luis Antonio may not have been present at Michaela’s house that evening, contrary to what he had previously said.

10. On 3 May, he had not woken at 9.00am as previously stated, but at 8.00am.

11. He had not driven to Michaela’s house that morning after 10.00am as previously stated; instead he had left home at 8.45am for a 9.30am meeting with the owner of the business tourist complex called ‘Gold Bunker’ in the Espiche district and her father-in-law.

12. He now remembered that he and Michaela had visited two apartments for about 30 minutes, probably on the afternoon of 3 May.

13. He and Michaela had lunch with the owner of the ‘Gold Bunker’ complex and her father-in-law, a fact he had not disclosed to police before.

14. Michaela’s daughter C______ was not with them that day, contrary to his previous story.

15. They went to the Palmares Golf Club in the afternoon, another fact Murat had failed to disclose.

16. He now admitted to making two telephone calls, to Sergei Malinka and Michaela, at 11.39pm and 11.40pm that night.

17. He previously said he had woken at 9.00am on Friday 4 May. He now admitted he had telephoned Michaela at 8.27am and must have got up earlier.

Dr Gerald McCann says he was playing tennis most of that afternoon.

by Woof 08.08.12 7:03

If you're going on holiday with 3 children under the age of 4, you know the resort is spread out, you've checked it out online why wouldn't you bring a buggy? You get a decent baggage allowance for each child and their clothes could probably be packed into one or two suitcases so a buggy is no extra cost. And when the family were being flown out by Mark Warner I'm sure the first question would have been what they might need to bring out, surely someone in the group would have told them to bring a buggy at some point. Very very strange that.

by **tigger** 08.08.12 7:19

Woof wrote:If you're going on holiday with 3 children under the age of 4, you know the resort is spread out, you've checked it out online why wouldn't you bring a buggy? You get a decent baggage allowance for each child and their clothes could probably be packed into one or two suitcases so a buggy is no extra cost. And when the family were being flown out by Mark Warner I'm sure the first question would have been what they might need to bring out, surely someone in the group would have told them to bring a buggy at some point. Very very strange that.

'No buggies' is the excuse for not using the Millenium. But the other couples used the Millenium all week for breakfast.
So imo the 'no Millenium' is the thing they are trying to explain in whatever way possible. They think it's important to do so, let's have a look at it:

From the topic: Re the baby buggies.

But in GM's witness statement on 10th May 2007 he says this.............

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

http://www.mccannfiles.com/id261.html#tap10

Seems they lied. winkwink

by Miraflores 08.08.12 9:01

I think they might have been able to hire buggies from MW.

by **tigger** 08.08.12 11:59

Miraflores wrote:I think they might have been able to hire buggies from MW.

They would have known that on arrival day. When the whole OC is busy receiving new people and informing them of their services. There is one buggy seen in the airport bus. They shipped buggies back to the UK in September. For me the whole buggy affair is to explain why they weren't joining the others at breakfast. Two very fit sporty parents should be able to carry the twins. But Kate seems to have a bee in her bonnet about the Millenium.
This serves two purposes: they didn't know there were restaurants much closer and they didn't know PdL at all, not at all. So they had to ask a policeman where the church was on the night their daughter vanished.
As it happens the church is right next door to Chaplin's Bar, which they did manage to find before 3/5....

by Woof 08.08.12 13:28

tigger wrote:They shipped buggies back to the UK in September.

That's the piece of the puzzle I was missing, thanks. I was wondering what happened their buggy. It's a good lesson in not jumping to conclusions.

by Miraflores 08.08.12 16:39

Ah well now, perhaps when all the family came rushing over after the 'abduction' they brought the buggies with them. Because after all the McCanns had then decided to stay in Portugal forever, or at least until the twins were due to go to school, so they would need buggies. The Holiday - Page 2 110921

by russiandoll 30.08.12 14:07

Maybe they knew they would be staying in 5a in advance and would not need a buggy, they were extremely lucky for such a large group to be accommodated so conveniently for their needs....close to an eating place, close to the pool and tennis courts, close to a supermarket and close to the creches. Many other holidaymakers were located with some type of inconvenience I would imagine, either a hike to the creche or to tennis courts, or to somewhere to eat. I imagine not many would eat twice a day elsewhere when breakfast and dinner were included. Not the tapas bunch though, they were located close to all their needs. And of all the adults who were accommodated in an apartment owned by a McCann, it was the pair named McCann. Some coincidence that....
Why Portugal? Perhaps it had to be Portugal and Praia da Luz in particular, because that is where Maddie already was?

by **tigger** 30.08.12 15:30

russiandoll wrote: Maybe they knew they would be staying in 5a in advance and would not need a buggy, they were extremely lucky for such a large group to be accommodated so conveniently for their needs....close to an eating place, close to the pool and tennis courts, close to a supermarket and close to the creches. Many other holidaymakers were located with some type of inconvenience I would imagine, either a hike to the creche or to tennis courts, or to somewhere to eat. I imagine not many would eat twice a day elsewhere when breakfast and dinner were included. Not the tapas bunch though, they were located close to all their needs. And of all the adults who were accommodated in an apartment owned by a McCann, it was the pair named McCann. Some coincidence that....
Why Portugal? Perhaps it had to be Portugal and Praia da Luz in particular, because that is where Maddie already was?

Or they were very unlucky to be allotted the most vulnerable apartment right next to the dark car park and easy to observe from the road.
A family who used the apartment some weeks before for a holiday, felt it was too exposed.
How much more difficult would it have been for an abductor to take a child from any of the other apartments? Imo PdL was chosen (and known) and so was 5a.

by russiandoll 30.08.12 15:45

Is there on the forum a breakdown of the holiday into its days, I recall reading something along those lines somewhere?
It would be interesting to look at each day and note any strange goings on, especially as there was so much routine established , to see any changes.
one example, the phone use......the 30th April, as well as being a day when almost nothing happened, was there not total phone silence from certain members of the group? The silence on that day flags it up as being of major significance.

have found some discussion about early days, seems to end 30th April, will look again...

by **tigger** 30.08.12 16:14

russiandoll wrote: Is there on the forum a breakdown of the holiday into its days, I recall reading something along those lines somewhere?
It would be interesting to look at each day and note any strange goings on, especially as there was so much routine established , to see any changes.
one example, the phone use......the 30th April, as well as being a day when almost nothing happened, was there not total phone silence from certain members of the group? The silence on that day flags it up as being of major significance.

have found some discussion about early days, seems to end 30th April, will look again...

I think you might like these, but couldn't find 30/4 - http://forum2.aimoo.com/MadeleineMcCann/The-Holiday-1-68906

by russiandoll 30.08.12 16:24

You are psychic, Tigger ! Have just had a look at that site and then saw your post....thank you.
I think a trip to the police files and witness statements might help also, plus a look at the phone use/ non-use.