The note Kate McCann is certain led to Madeleine's disappearance

"The receptionist had added the reason for our request... We now bitterly regret it and will do so until the end of our days." 

Kate McCann, the mother of missing toddler Madeleine, is sure she knows what led to her daughter's disappearance. 

Madeleine was just three when she vanished while on holiday with her family in Portugal in 2007.

Her parents, Kate and Gerry, both now 54, have been the driving force behind one of the largest international searches and missing children's cases, and still believe their daughter is alive.

They also have their theories as to why Madeleine has yet to be found - and one of them in particular is a bombshell.

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The McCanns have never stopped looking for Maddy. Source: supplied

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The Ocean Club reservation book

Madeleine went missing from her family’s holiday apartment, while her parents and their friends were having dinner at the Ocean Club restaurant in the same hotel.

Twelve years later, in 2019, The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann documentary series dropped on Netflix. Towards the end of the series, a small but explosive detail in the case is revealed.

According to author Robbyn Swan, who co-wrote Looking for Madeleine in 2014, and who shares her insights throughout the documentary, Kate would never recover from what she saw  in the restaurant's reservation book.

Swan described the information as "the stuff of nightmares" for the McCanns.

In her own 2011 book, Madeleine: Our daughter’s disappearance and the continuing search for her, Kate reveals what that detail was, and its impact on her.

She explained that because the holidaying group’s children would all be asleep in their hotel apartments at dinner time, they requested that the group reserve the same table every night – the one with the best view of the apartments.

But it was only after Madeleine vanished that Kate discovered what the person who took the booking wrote in the open reservation book at the restaurant's entrance.  She realised it would have been clear to anyone working at the restaurant, or any curious member of the public, that the children would be unsupervised in their rooms.

The devastated mother wrote: "To my horror, I saw that, no doubt in all innocence and simply to explain why she was bending the rules a bit, the receptionist had added the reason for our request: we wanted to eat close to our apartments as we were leaving our young children alone there and checking on them intermittently.

"We now bitterly regret it and will do so until the end of our days."

Source: supplied

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"Detrimentally impacted the search"

The second belief the McCanns have about why Madeleine hasn't yet been found is related to the early days of the police search - something which they have been vocal about.

One of the most recent posts on the couple's website was in September 2022, describing their deep disappointment after losing their battle against Portuguese police officer, Goncalo Amaral - whom they believe detrimentally impacted the initial search for Madeleine.

"We took action for one and only one reason: Mr Amaral's unfounded claims were having a detrimental impact on the search for Madeleine," they wrote.

"If the public believed that we were involved in her disappearance, then people would not be alert for possible clues and may not report relevant information to the relevant law enforcement agencies."

Originally published as The note Kate McCann is certain led to Madeleine's disappearance