Hi all. I will be travelling to Georgia on business in a month and need some advice. Mon., Wed., and Thurs. I need to be in Atlanta but on Tues. I need to be in Athens. Would you suggest spending Mon. night in Athens or could I just drive there Tues. morning? I will be working 9-4ish. Is Athens a nice place to spend the night? Thanks--please let me know if you need more specifics.

Athens is a good hour-hour and a half from Buckhead. Traffic here is notoriously bad during rush hour but if you headed out of Buckhead or Midtown early in the AM, you would be going against traffic. Athens is a cute college town--young, plenty of cheap eats and nice restaurants too.

Any recommendations where to stay in Athens are most appreciated. Nothing sounds particularly appealing but a decent place downtown would be great. Thanks, everyone.

Traffic in Atlanta is so bad, I'd drive over and spend the night in Athens.

Hotels in Athens tend to be well-worn because all of the football traffic. The Holiday Inn and Courtyard are pretty close to downtown, but more worn that similar properties elsewhere. If you want to stay near downtown, then try the Foundry Park Inn.
www.foundryparkinn.com

If that doesn't suit you for any reason, then the Hampton Inn is a short drive to downtown.

The "commute" from the HI to D'town would be just about 5 minutes, 10 at the most.

No need to leave the night before to get to Athens. I commute from Buckhead to Athens 2 days a week and I am there in just about an hour leaving in the morning. One thing to keep in mind though is that if you are coming back to Atlanta in the morning you will hit quite a bit of traffic. If you don't need to, you can just drive back to Atlanta the same day since traveling back into Atlanta in the evening will be against traffic as well. Good luck!