diff --git a/e2e/run.sh b/e2e/run.sh
index c7825bfd3..2977de560 100755
--- a/e2e/run.sh
+++ b/e2e/run.sh
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@ cd $(dirname "$0");
 
 readonly cluster_name="postgres-operator-e2e-tests"
 readonly kubeconfig_path="/tmp/kind-config-${cluster_name}"
+readonly spilo_test_image="registry.opensource.zalan.do/acid/spilo-cdp-12:1.6-p16"
 
 function pull_images(){
 
@@ -38,6 +39,7 @@ function start_kind(){
   kind create cluster --name ${cluster_name} --config kind-cluster-postgres-operator-e2e-tests.yaml
   kind load docker-image "${operator_image}" --name ${cluster_name}
   kind load docker-image "${e2e_test_image}" --name ${cluster_name}
+  kind load docker-image "${spilo_test_image}" --name ${cluster_name}
   KUBECONFIG="$(kind get kubeconfig-path --name=${cluster_name})"
   export KUBECONFIG
 }
diff --git a/e2e/tests/test_e2e.py b/e2e/tests/test_e2e.py
index b5ba32b6d..f95efe2e9 100644
--- a/e2e/tests/test_e2e.py
+++ b/e2e/tests/test_e2e.py
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ class EndToEndTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
     '''
 
     # `kind` pods may stuck in the `Terminating` phase for a few minutes; hence high test timeout
-    TEST_TIMEOUT_SEC = 1000
+    TEST_TIMEOUT_SEC = 600
 
     @classmethod
     @timeout_decorator.timeout(TEST_TIMEOUT_SEC)