TRURO - The weather couldn't have been better to bring people out to celebrate say organizers of Colchester County's Canada Day events.
However, the numbers of people who took in the celebrations took a hit as stores remained open Sunday due to Monday's holiday.
"The attendance is not quite as good as last year," said Wilson MacDonald, second vice-president of the Royal Canadian Legion in Truro. "We're down a few and I would credit that to the stores being open today."
It has been a long-standing tradition for the legion to host a community celebration at Victoria Park in Truro including an afternoon of live entertainment, a canteen, cake and children's games.
The event draws more than 1,000 people to the park each year.
In Bible Hill, Paula Williams-Humes was one of the first smiling faces parade participants greeted as they pulled into St. Davids Avenue off Pictou Road to lineup.
She has been helping organize the start of the parade for several years and said there were noticeably fewer entries this year.
"I think it's smaller," she said. "Just by a little bit though."
The procession of about 35 entries took about an hour to complete the route surrounding the village with thousands of spectators lining the streets.
A crowd of patriotic partiers also gathered in Brookfield for cake, music and fun. Attendance there was also a bit less than a year ago, but still numbered in the hundreds.
MacDonald said while there were less people sprawling on the park grounds than previous years, she was still pleased with the turnout.
"This is such a great day," he said. "Everybody is happy. Here is Truro. This community is second-to-none. People are very community-minded and we have a lot of pride here."
The legion member said the organization is passionate about hosting the July 1 event for the community.
"It's our day to celebrate Canada," said MacDonald. "November 11 is our day too, to remember the soldiers that made the sacrifices for their country. This is a day to celebrate the reason they died."
He said the legion partners with other organizations and local businesses to host the event such as Scotsburn Dairy, which supplied the ice cream offered free to children during the day.
Members of local sea, navy and army cadet corps also pitched in to help.
Legion volunteers passed out cake and kept a steady flow of hotdogs and hamburgers coming hot off the grill from their canteen.
"We really don't do this to make money because our prices are quite low but we don't want to have stuff left over," said MacDonald.
It's a balancing act to make sure there is just enough to go around and MacDonald said they had one box of hamburgers left at about 2 p.m. and felt confident they had just the right amount to finish off the day's celebrations.
