At the weekend, the press zone inside the hotel grounds morphed into a public zone, and the crowds were astonishing. Two thousand people inside the paddock – that's up from barely a dozen in 2009.
A huge queue of people zig-zagged up and down Grove Mill Lane; it's estimated that another 2,000 were turned away. So, more people were turned away from Bilderberg 2013 than had shown up to all previous Bilderberg conferences put together. If that's not a sign of the times, I don't know what is.
But the biggest change has been in the coverage. Finally, after 59 years, Bilderberg has beeped its way onto the radar of the mainstream press.
Basílio showed me photocopies of some Portuguese papers. He translated from the Diário Económico: "They get together to define the political agenda of the world." Portugal's main opposition leader, António José Seguro, was confronted by journalists on live television, and asked about Bilderberg. "He was very angry, he turned his face and said he would not answer."
David Cameron is likely to face questions from journalists about the visit he paid to Bilderberg on Friday. But he'll be fine about that, as Downing Street declared: "The Prime Minister has always been clear about the importance of transparency."
Tamsin Cave of the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency is sceptical. "The Prime Minister is a public servant. His job is to represent the public interest. When he is meeting with this elite group of business leaders whose interest is he really serving?"
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