Fruitbowl - Fresh Ideas from Hawke's Bay

For those of you I haven't met, my name is Belinda Henley. I am a relatively new arrival to the Bay, moving here at the end of last year.

That's me on the left. My background is as a print and broadcast journalist, I have worked for networks like CNN, the BBC, Reuters, Associated Press and Al Jazeera in London and Los Angeles and have also worked on and off for TV3 for the past 14 years. I also do print writing for magazines and newspapers.

I am currently setting myself up as a freelance journalist based here and am wanting to reach out to any possible contacts who may have great story ideas from the region, I know there is plenty going on and plenty of great stories to tell.

My are of interest is broad, in my career so far I have covered everything from rugby to the stock markets, international film festivals and major court cases. I am hoping to cover a little bit of everything from here.

However I do have one particular area of interest, I am going to be joining Hawke's Bay Today as a food writer (dabbling in wine). I will edit a weekly page for them which will appear in Saturday's '48Hours' section. It is still a bit of a work in progress but please if you hear of any new and interesting things going on in this industry, new cafes, ground breaking chefs, wonderful wines, unique products, eccentric people etc etc please let me know! I also plan to continue filing stories for 3News and writing for some national newspapers and magazines.

I am just starting to establish some contacts and networks here so please let me know if there is anyone you think I should be tapping into, the more information coming my way- the better!

Thanks for your time and I look forward to hearing from you.

Belinda