Power, water and reception have returned to most of the Trentham area, but Blackwood locals might still be waiting days for power to return.

Aceloch Earthmoving owner Jack Griffiths has had his entire workforce clearing roads and rescuing locals who were trapped in their houses due to fallen trees since 7am on Thursday morning.

"It took us four hours to clear 2km at the Falls Road turn-off," he said.

"Up near the Trentham tip was probably the worst - it took about an hour to clear 100 metres."

Jack is part of Trentham's Community Emergency Response Team, and was put in charge of coordinating emergency contractors for the storm relief efforts.

"I was struggling for men too, because they couldn't actually get into Trentham," he said.

His son Jaike, a Lyonville local, was also part of the clear-up efforts and said he didn't realise how bad it was until he tried to drive into Trentham.

"We went from Lyonville to Trentham with just a chainsaw, it took ages" he said.

"The first day was overwhelming because there was just so much."

Jaike spent Monday clearing a laneway in between Trentham and Little Hampton where one house was still trapped by a fallen tree.

"I can't see an end to it at the minute, it's going to be months," he said.

"The CFA have been amazing, they've been cooking everyone lunch and dinner. They gave us free drinks at the Cosmo last night too."

Hepburn Shire deputy mayor Brian Hood said people in the area were doing remarkably well given the circumstances.

"It is a pretty resilient community and there's a sense of togetherness and people helping out," he said.

Cr Hood said not having a way to communicate with each other via phone really exacerbated the difficulty of the storm.

"Friday afternoon we had a community briefing on the corner but even just to get the crowd to it and let people know, the police literally drove around the streets with the loud-hailer telling people about the meeting," Cr Hood said.

Local authorities also went door knocking to inform residents not to drink the tap water when the town's supply reached 10 per cent.

"What was also happening was that people in Melbourne would see media coverage about Trentham being hit really hard and a lot of people couldn't get in contact with relatives who lived here," Cr Hood said.

IN OTHER NEWS:

"So we went door-knocking to make sure people were all ok and then we managed to get a message back to their worried loved ones."

Cr Hood drove around on Sunday afternoon to survey the damage and found several outer roads that had not yet been cleared of fallen trees.

The council has prioritised clearing trees that pose a safety risk, but there is a long road ahead to clear the entire area.

"Now we're in clean-up mode, it's too early to say how long that will take," Cr Hood said.

The Commonwealth-State Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements (DRFA) are providing emergency relief payments for residents who were severely impacted by the extreme weather.

Have you signed up to The Courier's variety of news emails? You can register below and make sure you are up to date with everything that's happening in Ballarat.