If You had gone down to a North Lincolnshire wood on Saturday night, the big surprise would have been meeting hundreds of young people on an orienteering event.

If You had gone down to a North Lincolnshire wood on Saturday night, the big surprise would have been meeting hundreds of young people on an orienteering event.

The Humber Nite Challenge, an overnight exercise for youngsters aged between 14 to 19, was held at the Primrose Hill woodland site, off Mortal Ash Hill.The event, which will now be held on an annual basis, replaces the old Nite Pilot competition, which was discontinued by North Lincolnshire Council about eight years ago.

Geoff Ogden, director of organisers the Tribune Trust and event coordinator, said it had proved a great success - with around 75 teams of five navigating their way around the woodland.

And he said: "I do not think there is any doubt we will be introducing Nite Challenge as a permanent, annual feature."

He said, however, more schools and youth groups needed to put the event on the top of their agenda.

"I would like to see more young people taking part who would not normally get this sort of opportunity," he explained.

"The course they were undertaking throughout the woodland took them about four hours. And they had to carry out tasks at the 10 checkpoints," he said.

The entrants, who came from throughout the Humber region, had to use their navigational skills to locate the checkpoints.

Their arrival at the specified points was timed and this contributed to their overall marks which will be totalled up in the coming days to determine the winner.

"It's all down to teamwork," said Mr Ogden.

George Koudis, captain of the John Leggott A team, set off with his four colleagues at about 11pm.

"It was pretty good. The best part was the team-building," he said.

"When we got back, we had a bit of a celebration. We finished at about 3am. And I was at home in bed for about 4.30am," he added.

He said he was confident their team did reasonably well. But, he explained: "We got stuck at one of the checkpoints, because there was quite a queue.

"We didn't realise it at the time, but it set us back about half-an-hour. The rain slowed us down as well.

"For the last part we were almost running - it was challenging."

George said he had completed a Day Pilot about three years ago.

"That was a lot easier," he said.