For the past two months Tobias Carter and Sophie Simonin have been stuck in Bristol, in southwest England.

Like so many others, they were forced to change their plans because of the coronavirus lockdown in the UK. But unlike most others, what they had planned was very different: A four-month, 9,656 km round trip to the Arctic, in a sailing yacht. All part of a bid to highlight the damage being done to the region by climate change, and urging people to think about their own impact on the planet.

From Bristol, they're heading to France to pick up scientific equipment and crew. Then it's the long journey north, and multiple stops in Greenland. 

Whilst there, they'll do everything from setting up weather stations to see if wind power generation is possible, to planting thousands of trees to replace woodland lost to deforestation.

Talking to locals is also an important part of the trip, as Sophie told CGTN: "I think we're going to find that it's a lot hotter than it should be. People are changing their way of life, they are adapting to hotter weather, and their activities are changing. That's going to be really interesting to interview them to see how they cope with that, how they change their habits."

They are making the journey on the custom built Northabout yacht. It's no stranger to the Arctic, having been there on multiple occasions since it was built 20 years ago.

Its new owners are Arctic novices, who are under no illusion about how difficult the trip could be. They are driven on by a passion for the environment and the desire to spread a message.

Tobias said: "Sailing, you see and live with your environment. You're looking at the clouds, the water, the corals bleaching, you see a lot of damage. 

"The Arctic is the place on earth where you can actually see this happening. In terms of the climate, the Arctic they say today is literally changing colour. It's going from white to blue at an astonishing rate."

In the last 20 years, 75 percent of summer sea ice has and rising sea levels are threatening local communities in the region.

And as they set off on this journey, they already have the next one planned. If all goes well with this expedition, in 2021 they aim to sail from the Channel Islands, through the Northwest passage, all the way to Alaska.