Day 2 - 31st May 2015: Driving Driving Driving and we are still in QLD!!,,,

Headed out from Augathella this morning into a gorgeous outback sunrise.

Took it pretty steady til we got past that early morning light period when we might have seen some wildlife activity. As it was it was pretty quiet and we only saw a couple of Roos which gave us no issues.

So the route today is Tambo, Blackall (toilet break) , Barcaldine (yummy morning tea and coffee to go), Ilfracombe, Longreach (quick lunch stop with yummy yummy pies from the bakery) then onto Winton.  

All places we have been to previously on our travels in Outback Qld in 2013.

Snapped this nice outdoor artwork on the way through Tambo this morning.

From Winton we headed up the Lansbourough Highway making for McKinlay and the Walkabout Creek Hotel - famous as the pub where Crocadile Dundee was filmed. This is somewhere we wanted to check out and did not get to in 2013.

About 750km under our belt on the road today and we are staying tonight at - you guessed it  - the Walkabout Creek Hotel!!!  We pulled into camp bit later than we would like at 4.45pm - just as light was starting to fade into dusk.

We picked our camp site of course had to head into the pub for a quiet late afternoon cold beer on the front verandah - waving to to trucks as they rolled through town.

Just had to grab a shot of this lovely old house in this little community of McKinlay 

Not much excitement on the road today. Lots of hawks through part of the journey, a few goats, a few Roos and couple of emus - this is the account of the living wildlife we saw.  We sadly saw much more "road kill" especially the run from Blackall through Bacaldine and Longreach - where the road was just littered with dead Roos , couple emus and a sheep.

We are still to see our first "Wedgie" (Wedge Tail Eagle) on this road trip - but we keep looking!

The Walkabout Creek Hotel has campground out back with great bathroom facilities and great hot showers. All the staff were really friendly in the pub as are the relatively new owners (been here 14 mths) - they love it here. It's really only 100km to Cloncurry and this pub attracts a lot of visitors due to its links to the famous "Crocodile Dundee".

We were up early to grab some photos with sun coming up on the pub before heading off the next morning.

Off on the road again - on our way to NT!!!! - Day 1 - 30th May 2015

We were driving out the gate at 5am this morning - on schedule - amazing!!

Headed west out of Brisbane through Toowoomba and over the Great Divide. 3hrs later we are at Dalby for breakfast. Only 10 degrees here this morning at 8am.

Heading out again on the Warrego Hwy further west through Chinchilla, Miles and Roma. 

We pressed on through Roma and had a late lunch by the river in one of our favourite towns out this way - Mitchell. It was here we had a memorable feast and campfire by the river a couple of years ago with Cindy and Russ before heading off to Carnarvon Gorge.

Cindy would be flabbergasted that we did not make time to stop at the Artesian Baths in Mitchell - but we had to keep moving on

We were hoping to make Tambo tonight but decided to stop at Augathella (just 120km short of Tambo) - we have not been through Augathella before as it is a little off the highway.  

Great free camp here tonight with about 7x other over nighters.  It was still 29 degrees when we arrived at about 3.45pm - but we are expecting it to chill off a fair bit overnight.

Stopping at this time meant we could get in a walk along the levee bank that runs along the Warrego River - which, in Augathella at least, appears to be bone dry. It was great to stretch the legs after 760km in the car today.

Our free camp spot is at the Warrego Riverside park right opposite the pub in Augathella. it's a great spot with shade and grassy areas - even has flushing toilets and its free!!  

Love the free camps in these little places - as long as everyone makes sure they spend a bit of money in them so that it makes it worthwhile for the town to provide them.

We sat here tonight enjoying our first wine and first night on the road. It's was a pretty good day of travelling today with great weather and not too much road kill - although it has started to increase the further we have come. But that is the way of things out here!!

We did strike a couple of herds of cattle on the road - one lot between Roma and Mitchell (must have been at least 500 head) - and then again just before reaching the turn off for Augathella we came across a guy and a girl on horses driving the cattle across the road ahead of us. Of course we had time to get the camera out and snap a picture.