The highways connects the Waverly Hall area with Covington, via Thomaston, Barnesville, and Jackson.

Almost immediately, it crosses into Talbot County and travels in a fairly northeasterly direction, before curving to the east-northeast to meet SR 41 in Greens Mill.

SR 36 continues to the east-northeast and crosses over the Flint River on the Wynns Bridge into Upson County, in Pleasant Hill.

At Rose Avenue, SR 18 splits off to the west, while the other highways very briefly travel along the Barnesville–Aldora city line, before re-entering Barnesville proper.

Northeast of there, the highway crosses over the Towaliga River on the David P. Ridgeway Bridge, before entering Jackson, where it has a brief concurrency with US 23/SR 16/SR 42 (3rd Street).

Here, it turns to the right, where it follows the bypass until it meets its eastern terminus, an intersection with US 278/SR 12/SR 142 in the northeastern part of the city.

[18][19] A few months later, the entire Newton County portion that didn't have a hard surface was under construction.

[23][24] A year later, a portion of SR 36 north of Jackson also had a sand clay, top soil, or stabilized earth surface.

[34][35] Possibly in relation to SR 36's former northern terminus in Covington's town square, when later episodes of The Dukes of Hazzard were filmed on a set in California, crudely-produced SR 36 route markers were displayed at an intersection near the Hazzard County Court House.

In 1978, The Dukes of Hazzard filmed its first five episodes on location in Covington and nearby Conyers.

A SR 36 sign is visible in the Covington town square in the ninth minute of The Cannonball Run.

A SR 36 sign is visible in the series In the Heat of the Night in part two of the first episode of Season 2.