The first challenge on July 6 was to actually get to the protest. The main motorway to Gleneagles was blocked preventing the timely arrival of anyone coming from Glasgow, Edinburgh or anywhere else to the south of the venue.
The bus on which I travelled took almost three hours for a one hour journey. Police prevented a number of buses from leaving Edinburgh at all.
Initially police were saying they would not allow more than 5000 people to protest at the perimeter around the summit, then at 11am - one hour before the protest was due to start - they put out a media alert that the protest had been cancelled, which it hadn't.
Then, when buses were late to arrive, police tried to insist that the 2000 people who had gathered at the starting point at the appointed time begin the march. They refused to march until the buses arrived.
Activists told me that media figures and politicians have for months been claiming that the local residents of Auchterarder - the town near Gleneagles -didn't want the protesters to come.
However, the most striking thing I noticed when I arrived was the large number of buildings - churches, businesses and residences - that sported supportive banners, posters, and photocopied or homemade signs, in most cases reading "make poverty history". Even some of the businesses that were boarded up had these signs.
The march involved a broad cross-section of the left with recognised contingents from every corner of the radical movement including the Scottish Socialist Party, the various socialist parties from the rest of Britain, Greens, anarchists, the Stop the War Coalition and various NGOs.
People came from all over Europe to be at the protestcame across people from Ireland, Germany, Greece, France and Italy for instance and undoubtedly other coun tries would have been represented.
On every leg of the march itself, we were greeted by local residents. Invariably they were waving and had a big smile on their face.
In many respects the march had a festival atmosphere. The anarchist "Clandestine Rebel Insurgent Clown Army" brought colour and humour to the demonstration, while the overall feeling was one of determinatien to confront the imperialist rulers.
"How long is the march?" | heard someone ask at one point. "Until the war is over," was the response.
The march itself had to proceed through narrow village streets which caused a particular congestion at the fence blocking the road to the summit site. There were some attempts to break down the fence, but those who wanted to attempt to breach the perimeter fence discovered that a more promising opportunity lay across a nearby oat field.
Thousands made the attempt leading to almost surreal scenes of various groups of protesters, clowns and police traipsing backwards and forth through the field.
There were two outstanding features of the day. Firstly, the movement won a major victory just by virtue of the fact that the march proceeded at all against repeated attempts by authorities to deny the right to protest.
Secondly, the movement succeeded in articulating a radical, anti-capitalist message right at the gates of the G8 meeting.
This contrasts dramatically to the hollow pretence, of figures like Bono and Geldof, of supposed concern for the world's poor while at the same time dining (literally and figuratively) from the tables of the corporate rich.