The opening of the border with Australia in July last year was a dream come true for Wānaka pensioners Lin and Chris Tempest - or so they thought.

The couple hadn’t seen their children or grandchildren for two and a half years.

“We're in our seventies and we needed to see them really and we didn't know what was going to come,” Lin said.

“So we made a choice that we needed to come see them all.”

Eight months later the couple is stranded in Australia living in a friend's home in Albury Wodonga on the New South Wales border with Victoria.

Lin and Chris, who have family spread around Australia, booked a six week holiday, leaving Wānaka in July last year. Shortly after arriving in Australia, New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern announced that the travel ‘bubble’ would be paused due to an outbreak of the Delta variant.

“If we turn around and come home we would have been able to come home but we wouldn't have fulfilled what we needed to do,” Lin said.

“I believed also that when we made that choice the bubble would probably open up again.

“I didn’t at that stage think it would be as hard as it has been to come home.” 

Realising that the bubble would not reopen Lin and Chris tried to come home through the ballot system for returning New Zealanders, describing it as a “pretty awful” experience.

“The last ballot we went in had 17,500 applicants and 1,250 places,” Chris said.

“It’s shocking, I actually think it is unconstitutional. I don’t think you can lock people out of their native land.”

Lin and Chris joined the group Grounded Kiwis describing some of the stories they heard as “horrific”.

The group opposes the government’s Managed Isolation and Quarantine (MIQ) system and argues that entering New Zealand is a foundational right. They laid out their concerns in the High Court on Monday (February 14). 

“The thousands of people that are here in Australia, a lot of them have really hit difficulties as far as just living from day to day,” Lin said.

Stranded in Australia and uncertain about when they might return to New Zealand the couple were shocked when their superannuation pension was cancelled due to them being out of the country for six months.

“We need that when we’re over here. We need it to feed ourselves.”

“We’ve had to show documents to prove that we tried to get home which I find very demeaning because as New Zealand citizens and as pensioners we shouldn’t have to do that.”

Lin said she knows of others who have not had their pension continued.

“The biggest thing for me is the stress of not knowing, not knowing when you're going to be able to come home.

“People say… you know you made your choice, but choice or no choice there is that absolute devastation of just not being able to come home if you want to come home.

“Unless you are in this position, it is very hard for somebody else to judge you. There have been a lot of nasty things written.

“When I weigh it up I’d much prefer to have seen all my children, seen all my grandchildren, had birthdays with them, had celebrations with them that I would never have had. That has kept us going really.

“We just feel very lucky now that we have a date [to come home].”

Anyone in Australia can travel to New Zealand by July 2022.

New Zealand's borders will reopen to New Zealand citizens and residents and other eligible travellers under current border settings from Australia at 11:59pm on February 27, 2022.

Anyone in Australia can travel to New Zealand by July 2022.

Travellers will self-isolate on arrival, and will have to meet other health requirements.

PHOTOS: Supplied