Day 34/ 35 (July 2nd / 3rd, 2015): The Tablelands Highway - now that was fun - NOT!!

We sadly drove out of King Ash Bay this morning. I think I could have happily stayed another couple of days - but if we are not to be driving long days and rushing home we need to get on the move again heading South West towards Brissie.

We were seen off with hugs and well wishes for a safe journey from our neighbourly campers - Spud and Pat, Diane and Allan, Phil and his wife (lovely lady but just can't bloody remember her name). Thanks guys for making this a very pleasant few days at King Ash Bay.

Back we drove to Cape Crawford (& the Heartbreak Hotel) where we took a left turn onto the Tablelands Highway.

A bit hilly and windy at first - and then the "forever flat" landscape of the Barkly Tableland.

Lots of people had warned us about the Tablelands Highway and what it was like - and it lived up to expectations - as the crappiest "highway"  we have travelled this whole trip. 

Very tiring and stressful driving - always looking to avoid the worst of the rough edges of the one-lane tar when you need to get off the tar for other vehicles, caravanners - and to top it off - road trains are coming at you. 

Then throw in worrying about the road trains coming up behind you and also dodging the road kill on the road, the live wallabies/ Roos hopping across the road, wandering stock and the Wedge-tailed Eagles that typically are very slow to move off any road kill on the roads.

A roadside stop for lunch (Kiena) where who should role in but Dennis and Robin - they had decided to take the same route into Mt Isa (as Dennis needed to get to see an Opthamologist and have one of his eyes checked out).  They told us they had nice fresh fish for dinner and were going to camp overnight at the next free camp on this road - "Brunette Downs". They invited us to join them for a BBQ fish dinner.

We were safely in camp by about 2.30pm and enjoyed a lovely late afternoon of drinks and nibbles with them - and a nice beer battered fish dinner next to a little campfire - all out in the middle of absolutely nowhere on the Barkly Tableland.

My kind of camping!!

It was another gorgeous outback sunset to top off the evening!!

And a full moon - low in the eastern sky and early to rise - just on sunset, this evening.

We were able to get well off the road at this camp stop - as there were many tracks leading back off the main roadside stop. 

It was a great overnight free camp - a bit windy out here on the Barkly Tableland - but we had no truck noise (where we were well back off the road) and we had a good cosy nights sleep.

it's starting to get much cooler nights for us now!

We woke to a beautiful clear morning - bit cool but no wind - and the sun started warming us up pretty quickly. 

On the way out this morning we were amazed to notice this birds nest that was built at the top of the old disused windmill at the road side stop!!

We were facing up to more driving on the Tablelands Highway - but only the 150km into Barkly Homestead - where we had morning tea and said our goodbyes to Robin & Dennis. We would be making our way a bit faster than them today (Friday) as they didn't want to get into Mt Isa until Monday.

We made good time after quite a lengthy stopover at Barkly Honestead and we were crossing the border back into QLD in good time.

By 3pm we had been into Camooweal for bottle of wine and were set up at Camooweal Billabong (another free camp site just west of the little town of Camooweal) with lots of other travellers.

The General store here is also the post office for this small population of 310.

A monument in Camooweal to the Drovers of the region.