By Thane Grauel

WESTPORT — Hurricane Henri was a near-show here on Sunday, sparing the town from predicted floodwaters and wind damage.

The Category 1 hurricane was expected to plow into the central coast of Connecticut after ripping across Long Island. But it took an unexpected detour, veering to the right and hitting Eastern Connecticut and Rhode Island.

No one here was complaining.

“There’s nothing worse than power outages,” said Peter Bogdanowicz of Jersey City, N.J., who was visiting his fiancé in Westport.

Later in the afternoon he was casting a fishing pole into the Saugatuck River at Parker Harding Plaza.

In the river, shiners and other small fish appeared abundant. There also were several cormorants and egrets, perhaps taking advantage of the lack of humans and traffic.

Bogdanowicz wore surf gear and sandy flip-flops. The weather, he said, didn’t stop him from swimming earlier at Compo Beach.

Main Street was a ghost town, with just a handful of businesses open, and almost no parked cars. Parker Harding, which had many store entrances dammed off with sandbags, also was nearly empty.

The hurricane’s surprise detour was no doubt a relief to merchants, who have seen their businesses flooded before when the Saugatuck River swells over its banks.

Compo Beach’s entrance was closed off with yellow tape. Burying Hill Beach also was closed. The approach to Sherwood Island State Park was blocked by plastic barrels.

None of that stopped people walking dogs, pushing kids in strollers, strolling and jogging. At least until the rain turned from a misty drizzle to something more drenching.

Robert Dranitzke of Westport was jogging in the drizzle along Whitney Street, with sons Thor, 7, and Leo, 5.

“We’re trying to burn off some energy,” he said. “They were going stir-crazy being cooped up.”

Linda Lange of Westport was walking her dog, Charlie, with her 6-year-old granddaughter, Emma, at Winslow Park mid-afternoon.

“We came out when it had stopped,” she said of the rain, which was again picking up in intensity.

“We walked all the way to Saugatuck School,” she said.

Chris Russo and Analisa Robertson also walked their dog, Cannoli, a 2-year-old Corgie, in the drizzle at Winslow Park.

“All the stores are closed,” Robertson said.

But one of her favorites, Pokeworks near Trader Joe’s, wasn’t, and she said she was looking forward to eating a to-go sushi bowl after the walk.

A few minutes before 6 p.m., hours after Henri was downgraded to a tropical storm, blue patches of sky were visible beyond the bands of dark gray clouds moving quickly to the east.

In the early evening, convoy after convoy of utility trucks from states to the south could be seen convoying northbound on Interstate 95, with yellow lights flashing — a reminder that the storm did actually make landfall somewhere.

At 7:30 p.m., Eversource had just under 24,000 customers in Connecticut without power, the vast majority of which were east of New Haven.