BARGAIN hunters ignored the wet weather yesterday to spend thousands of pounds on the first day of the sales.

Eager shoppers queued outside stores in all the region's major towns desperate to get their hands on the best deals.

In Gateshead, motorists queued at the MetroCentre which opened at 4.30am.

Next was the first of the centre's shops to open its doors, with shoppers able to pick up bargains from 5am.

By 3pm, more than 82,000 had gone into the MetroCentre and many more were expected to visit before the doors closed at 9pm.

A spokeswoman for the centre said: "Customers were able to come in from 4.30am and there were people here from then. It has been a really busy day with lots of people leaving with carrier bags. The car park has been hectic with people wanting to enjoy the first day of the sales."

Although many shops in Darlington opened early, people were still waiting for the doors to open.

Queues formed in the rain outside Next, Woolworths and Wilkinsons and there were crowds outside Binns, which opened at 8.30am.

One shopper, Lisa Walker from Darlington, was laden with bags by 9am.

She said: "There are some real bargains to be had and it's well worth the rush to pick up the good things."

Manager of the Cornmill Centre in Darlington, Albion Small, watched hundreds of people flood in.

He said: "It has been unbelievable. It started off fairly quietly, but by 11am it was pandemonium.

"It has been a brilliant first day of the sales for us and the rest of the town seems to have been as busy as us."

In North Yorkshire, people were also eager to start spending, with bargain hunters braving the winter chill to queue outside major stores in York in the early hours.

Hardened shoppers began queueing up just after 4am eager to pick through the rails when the Next store, in Coney Street, opened at 6am.

Adam Sinclair, chairman of York Chamber of Trade, said: "York is a very special shopping environment and I think the sales figures will be a lot better than last year's flood-related figures.