Day two of our border tour started with an early morning briefing. Before even switching on the avionics of my Blackwing, I made a 30-minute phone call to Pansa 3, the Polish flight information service. I had prepared my route carefully, but I wanted to double-check with them about the military zones and corridors in eastern Poland. The lady on the phone was incredibly helpful and patient – going through my plan line by line, explaining what to avoid, and suggesting small changes. That call gave me real confidence: when you are flying close to sensitive borders, every mile matters.

We had originally thought about flying over the Baltic Sea to bypass Kaliningrad, but quickly ruled it out. The thought of having to make an emergency landing in the Russian enclave – with today’s political tensions – didn’t feel like an option I’d ever want to test. Instead, we aimed for the narrow land corridor between Kaliningrad and Belarus. It’s a geopolitical fault line: if ever a conflict breaks out in this region, it’s here that it will happen.

Taking off from Gdańsk, a busy international airport, was an experience in itself. Taxiing between the big jets, escorted by “Follow Me” cars, and yet… all of this for just a two-digit bill. Gdańsk really welcomes VFR traffic; it felt organised, friendly, and efficient.

We climbed to FL 65 (Flight Level 6,500 feet – about 2 km above sea level) and settled into cruise. The Blackwing purred along effortlessly, nearly 300 km/h across the Polish countryside. For about two hours we flew steady and smooth, before descending into Druskininkai, Lithuania – just a stone’s throw from the Belarusian border.

Druskininkai turned out to be quite a surprise. I expected a sleepy border town, but what I saw was modern and lively, far more developed than I had imagined. Landing, however, was strange: nobody answered my phone calls or the radio. Silence. We landed anyway, carefully staying clear of the restricted zones. A border patrol vehicle appeared nearby, but nothing came of it.

The real challenge came after touchdown: fuel. The airfield had no fuel service, no barrels, nothing. That’s when local help made all the difference. My friend Olga from emma technologies in Luxembourg, originally Lithuanian, had kindly offered to meet us there. She not only picked us up but also helped us find a shop that sold empty barrels – so that we could then fill them at a regular gas station. Without her, this could have turned into a long and difficult afternoon. Big thanks and a big hug to Olga!

With tanks refilled, it was time to continue. Druskininkai may look peaceful today, but standing on that airfield, so close to Belarus, you realise: if war were ever to flare up in this region, this is where it would begin. For now, though, it was just another successful stop on our journey – the Blackwing proving once again how reliable, fast, and efficient it is.

Next stop: Narva, Estonia.