JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- The fickle storm that carved a dizzying path across Florida and entered the record books with four separate landfalls leaves behind a trail of standing water, downed trees, power outages and frayed nerves.

To the relief of Floridians, Tropical Storm Fay is on a path that should take it away from the state for good later this weekend.

As Tropical Storm Fay's torrential rains diminished across northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia on Friday, residents across northeast Florida discovered just how much trouble the storm had caused.

Some found their homes flooded, and others were unable get around because of waterlogged roadways.

Tens of thousands of people from Melbourne to Jacksonville to Gainesville were still without electricity Saturday morning, and residents of Florida's storm-stricken Atlantic coast faced a weekend of cleanup after chest-high flooding.

Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty said that nearly 4,000 flood claims from Fay had been filed, and the number is expected to grow much higher in the coming days.

"The damage from Fay is a reminder that a tropical storm does not have to reach a hurricane level to be dangerous and cause significant damage," said Gov. Charlie Crist, who toured flooded communities this week.

Northeast Florida residents from Jacksonville's Westside to St. Johns and Nassau counties found Fay-related flooding was one of the most serious problems they faced.

"It got bad late last night and early this morning. That's when the flooding really started," Channel 4 reporter Sean Woodland said as he stood in calf-deep water near McCoys Creek.

When the Westside creek crested it left some vehicles in a nearby road nearly completely covered with water.

Woodland said although the rain had stopped and the water had begun to recede at about 5 p.m. Friday, some roads in the area remained impassible.

More than 100 patients at a nursing home on Moncrief Road were evacuated by boat when water from a rising creek entered the first floor of the building. [Full story]

In the Riverside area, the St. Johns River spilled over into the streets. Friday night, several bicyclists in the area found themselves struggling to bike on swamped sidewalks.

The Grand Avenue Bridge over the Ortega River remained closed due to flooding.

Fay also caused flooding problems in the nation's oldest city. Several streets in the historic downtown area of St. Augustine had to be shut down.

By 5 p.m. Friday, the sky over St. Augustine began to clear and the floodwaters began to recede. City leaders later deactivated the emergency operations center.

The Bridge of Lions, which was intermittently closed for the two days it took Fay to pass, was reopened on Friday afternoon.

Clay County will remain under a flood warning as Black Creek -- already 3 feet over flood stage -- is forecast to continue to rise through Sunday afternoon.

The creek creep into the yards and close to homes on Friday, reaching 18.7 feet by 8:45 p.m.

"Once it reaches 19 feet, that's when people will have to start worrying about moving out their belongs," Channel 4's John Dunlap said.

A few roads were shut down because of high water. One family moved items from its garage to higher ground. Several residents along Lazy Acre Road also moved their vehicles to higher ground.

Counties on both side of the Florida-Georgia border also remained under a flood warning as the St. Marys River was 4 feet over flood stage Friday night and forecast to rise at least 3 more feet by Sunday morning before beginning to recede.

Thousands Remain Without Power

While falling trees and rising water affected hundreds of homeowners, power outages plagued more than 100,000 homes and businesses in northeast Florida on Thursday night and Friday.

JEA has worked around the clock to get the power back in greater Jacksonville. At 11 a.m. Saturday, more than 47,000 JEA customers were still without electricity. The areas with the largest numbers of outages were Arlington and the Northside.

"I want customers to know that if at 7 a.m. your power is still out, we need you to call us. That will help us," said JEA executive director Jim Dickerson late Friday. "Don't look at that as a promise that we can have everybody in very soon -- verify that the outages that we have recorded is the same thing we're hearing from customers."

To report outages to JEA call 904-665-6000.

Around the region, thousands of customers of FPL, Clay Electric and other utilities were still waiting for power to be restored.

What's Next For Fay?

Fay has been an unusual storm, even by Florida standards. It set sights on the state last Sunday and first made landfall in the Florida Keys on Monday. The storm then headed out over open water again before hitting a second time near Naples on the southwest coast. It limped across the state, popped back out into the Atlantic Ocean, stalled, then drifted ashore again near Flagler Beach.

Before dawn Saturday, Fay moved ashore near Apalachacola, making it the first storm in recorded history to hit the state with such intensity four different times.

At 11 a.m. Saturday, the center of the storm was about 100 miles east-southeast of Pensacola. Fay was moving west near 7 miles per hour, with sustained winds at 45 mph. The storm was expected to slowly weaken over the weekend.

Counties in the Panhandle -- including Bay, Escambia and Walton -- opened their emergency operations centers in preparation for the storm's expected arrival there.

A tropical storm warning was in effect for the northeastern Gulf Coast from Suwannee River Florida west to the mouth of the Pearl River, which forms the border between Mississippi and Louisiana.

On Friday, Crist asked the White House to elevate the disaster declaration President George W. Bush issued Thursday to a major disaster declaration.

Crist said the storm damaged 1,572 homes in Brevard County alone, dropping 25 inches of rain in Melbourne. County officials put preliminary damage estimates at $53 million.