Can you believe with all these employees and passers-by that children so young were left unattended even if only for a moment, let alone at half-hour intervals. Wasn't there supposed to have been a suspect who died on a tractor; the details escape me for the moment.
Steve_uk, it's not that kind of a place believe me, it's not one of those areas where there are tens or hundreds of people are walking about in the streets of an evening! It's a really quiet place, nice and quiet, and peaceful. With the benefit of hindsight it is easy for us to judge the McCanns for the risks they took in leaving there three children! I've been there for over a week, staying in the apartment block directly across the street from the entrance to apartment 5A where it all took place! People sit out on their balconies, and walk to and from between the tapas bar restaurant area and their apartments in drive and drabs! Many parents have probably left their children home alone whilst staying at the ocean club, not necessarily post the date of the tragedy, but certainly beforehand! I think that the problem in this instance was the layout of apartment 5A which was set out differently to all the other apartments in that same block where the McCanns and their group of friends were staying - apartment 5A had a set of concrete steps leading up / down between the patio door on the poolside whereas none of the other apartments that their friends were staying in had this ease of access or exit! In the others case, they could only leave by the roadside door of their apartment ( compared to a possible two access / exit points for the McCanns!...
Maybe on that last occasion when the McCann parents left apartment 5A by the roadside door, having first of all ensured that they had left the sliding patio door on the poolside of the apartment unlocked, that they were being too clever for their own good! I think there might have been a degree of confusion created in the mind of the abductor once he realised that the McCanns had left the apartment by the roadside door which they locked behind them, maybe the abductor was left in two minds not knowing if the sliding patio door of apartment 5A was unlocked or not?
Having said that there would have been very little doubt in the abductors mind once he witnessed the 9.30pm check that was made of the McCann Apartment by Mathew Oldfield and Russell O'Brien. It's odds on that the abductor had witnessed the 9.30pm check, and possibly the previous check when Gerry McCann had checked it! Can we all be absolutely sure which doors Gerry McCann used to enter the apartment at the beginning of his check, and whether or not he used the exact same door when leaving it? I think establishing this can go a long way towards pinpointing the exact time that the abductor took Madeleine!
For example, if Gerry McCann either used the sliding patio door on the poolside of the apartment to enter it, and the same door to leave the apartment after his check, or he had entered via the sliding patio door but left by the roadside door, or alternatively, If Gerry McCann had entered the apartment by the roadside door, but left by the ceiling patio door, then this opens up a window of opportunity to be almost certain that the abductor had taken Madeleine in-between Gerry McCann leaving the apartment and the start of the next check by Russell O'Brien and Mathew Oldfield at 9.30pm...
If Gerry McCann used the sliding patio door at any stage during his 9.05pm check, it's odds on the the abductor saw him, and thereafter as soon as McCann entered the tapas reception doors he was in to take Madeleine!
This of course, fits in perfectly with the time that Stephen Carpenter says he and his family left the tapas bar restaurant that evening (somewhere between 9.15pm and 9.30pm)..
Bingo!!!
