Tears of joy as bubble flyers reach Blenheim

‘‘Can you see them?’’

‘‘Not yet,’’ Fiona Ashenden replied to her son.

With large smiles on their faces, Fiona and Chris Ashenden were pointing at the Air New Zealand plane that had landed on the tarmac at Marlborough Airport.

The plane was carrying the first quarantine-free travellers from Australia to reach Blenheim.

On that plane was Fiona’s daughter Elisa Wagstaff, with her two young daughters, Leila, 6, and Grace, 3.

Ashenden said she had not seen Wagstaff, a therapist living in Sydney, or her granddaughters for 16 months.

‘‘Sixteen months is not [just] too long, but far too long,’’ the Picton woman said.

‘‘My daughter was just waiting for the announcement of the opening of the trans-tasman bubble and she literally booked the first flight.’’

The first flight from Sydney arrived in Auckland just before 12.30pm. It had been expected to land at 11.20am.

Fifteen flights landed in Auckland from Australia on Monday, with about 400 flights expected to touch down on New Zealand soil by the end of the week.

When Elisa Wagstaff walked through Marlborough Airport at 4pm on Monday, she was in tears.

‘‘I am so happy to see them,’’ she said.

Leila and Grace ran to hug their grandmother and uncle.

‘‘The flight was long; today was a very long day. We’ve been up since 4am,’’ Wagstaff said.

‘‘She [Grace] fell asleep on the flight and I told her, ‘Fuffy’ – that is what they call their grandma – ‘is waiting.’ ’’

Wagstaff and her daughters were going to stay 12 days in New Zealand. Asked about their plans, they said they were going straight home to ‘‘keep hugging’’ and get some champagne.

Joyous scenes like this took place all day across New Zealand on what was the first day of the trans-tasman bubble.

Qantas said it would increase flights between the countries to about 200 each week, while Air New Zealand said it had quadrupled its flights to 30 on Monday, with its planes flying into New Zealand at 97 per cent capacity.

Australia was New Zealand’s largest source of international tourists before the pandemic, accounting for about 1.5 million arrivals or 40 per cent of total visitors in 2019.

And more than half a million New Zealand-born people live in

Australia, accounting for more than 2 per cent of Australia’s population of nearly 26 million.

Australia and New Zealand largely closed their borders to non-citizens and permanent residents more than a year ago, helping to keep their Covid-19 numbers relatively low compared with other developed countries.

Prime ministers Scott Morrison and Jacinda Ardern said in a joint statement that quarantinefree trans-tasman travel was a world-leading arrangement that opened up travel while aiming to keep Covid-19 out of the community.

The risks of quarantine-free travel would be under constant review, the statement said.

‘‘Travellers will need to be prepared for possible disruption to travel arrangements at short notice and to follow specific protocols before, during and after their travel.’’