TRURO - Earl didn't cause as much damage in central Nova Scotia as some people feared.
The hurricane, which was downgraded to a tropical storm, blew down trees and left thousands of people without power for a while, but did not cause major problems.
"I didn't see any damage when walking in Victoria Park after the storm," said Truro Mayor Bill Mills. "I think, compared to what Halifax got, we were very fortunate."
He and Colchester County Mayor Bob Taylor both said that most of the reports they heard were of trees knocked down around the area.
"Our power went out for few hours," said Taylor. "I didn't see much damage because I was obeying the advice to stay off the roads."
Most of those who were driving around were able to get by the trees and branches that came down, although the end of Brunswick Street, near East Prince Street, was completely blocked for a while on Saturday. In Truro's Victoria Square three large trees were damaged by the wind and were on the ground with their decorative lights tangled among the branches.
Crews continued to work throughout Saturday, removing any of the obstructions from roadways.
At the height of the storm Saturday afternoon, at least 8,000 Nova Scotia Power customers in Colchester County were without power from Stewiacke and Maitland through Truro and Bible Hill to Five Houses, Debert and Tatamagouche and many communities in between. Across the province more than 200,000 customers were without power during the storm.
Nova Scotia Power reported that there were more than 500 people out working to restore power during the storm.
By Monday afternoon all power had been restored in Colchester County, according to the utility's online outage map.
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