@Corbett After two hours of driving and it never fails that there is some accident and back up on the Mass Turnpike when I go, I’d prefer Amherst to be right off the Turnpike. For a place like Williamstown, of course there would be fully packed coolers and survival gear needed in true Swamp Yankee travel fashion. I would not mess around with a journey like that.
@Meddy Use your Waze app of course but this is starting to sound a tiny bit more like a reflection of @TTG 's driving than overzealous police. 
Like 60 miles (an hour and a half) west of nowhere?
@gearmom There are 40,000 college students within 10 miles of Amherst. The town is quaint, but it hardly feels like it is in the middle of nowhere (unless maybe you drove in through Belchertown)
Why would anyone go anywhere near Boston to go from Providence to Amherst?
Not one single time have I had a traffic problem anywhere near Amherst. My normal Amherst drive is to/from NYC (via Bronx/CT), to/from Boston (via Mass pike), to/from New London or to/from Ohio (via 90). I’m there probably 3x a year.
@ThankYouforHelp Wow. So much focus on that small aside. Amherst is not in the middle of nowhere but it feels like a pain to drive to IMO perhaps only, because I’ve already driven two hours and fought traffic when I drive there. I do not always feel patient to drive another half hour to 45 minutes depending on traffic, off highway. And sometimes that two hours to get the Turnpike exit becomes three due to accidents or construction. Now maybe I am just unlucky but I personally do not enjoy the drive which OP has to take. Maybe OP will be luckier with traffic. While it is not IN the middle of nowhere, it simply felt that way to me while driving there because you’re off highway and it was 45 minute longer than I would have liked. So OP, I do not mean to imply that Amherst is in the middle of the forest. It is just not my favorite drive and I am sure you will find it no big deal. Truly this was a very small point!
@OHMomof2 Really, she can drive however she’d like. Personally having driven 495 from the turnpike to 95, I have hit construction or traffic especially near the 495 to 95 junction. You never find any traffic on 495?,And 146 as an alternative can be really afford slow on Friday nights but perhaps you’ve had a different experience? And then for me the part on the turnpike before 495 has been congested. Now my husband drives that part of 95 every day. And often there is traffic just on 95 especially heading into Providence which can certainly delay his trip 30 minutes to 45 minutes and he knows all the work arounds.
I was simply suggesting a more pleasant route of Wesleyan to Warwick because the airport isn’t even in Providence and there would be no reason to go back to Providence if she is just catching a flight back down south in Warwick. Providence would be unnecessary traffic and expense unless there was a good reason to return. So if she was my sister, I would recommend going Brown to Amherst, then an hour or so south to Middleton CT. Then south to New London (quick look at Conn College which should be worth a stop IMO). And from New London to Warwick, the only really conveniently off the highway place of interest is Mystic IMO. Mystic can be reasonably priced for hotels especially off season, it has nice restaurants, an interesting historic seaport and aquarium. Providence would be unnecessary driving and expense, probably twice as expensive. If the goal was just to get back to the airport the next morning or squeeze in a look at Conn College which would be only a small backtrack, I’d recommend Mystic as a stop and this counter clockwise pattern of Brown to Amherst to Wesleyan to Conn College to Mystic to Warwick. Now certainly this could be different than your experience driving here, but our experience driving a lot around here is that and that would be my recommendation.
I agree with your route, @gearmom . Perhaps I misunderstood your objection to driving to Amherst, because all the bad traffic is near Providence and she has to leave there somehow, some way no matter what. I avoid 95 whenever I can (from Florida to Boston!). Very happy my D didn’t wind up at Conn or Brown, actually, mainly for that reason 
I use Google Nav to drive everywhere, it incorporates Waze’s data (not police/potholes/stopped cars but the big stuff like accidents that slow things down). It serves me well.
@OHMomof2 She is not driving the turnpike to Boston. What would you recommend as a route for getting to Providence on a Friday night? Around here we plan that route to avoid 95/128 traffic or 495 issues. We call that Boston traffic even though you are not in Boston proper. Additionally we plan for Providence rush hour.
90/146 most likely, @gearmom . Ready to change route if traffic warrants.
95 from Middletown to Warwick is likely faster but it also might not be, depending. You trade Boston “beyond the outerbelt” traffic for Hartford or New London’s traffic.
I didn’t actually have an opinion on which college to visit first, I just didn’t understand why anyone would go from Amherst to Providence via Boston, unless one was actually going to Boston.
And there is never traffic around Amherst on any of the routes in or out in any direction I have ever taken. As you near the big cities, of course that’s totally different.
Though this aspect, even if currently not literally the case, may have nonetheless appealed to a former member of their faculty:
– R. F.
Nice one @merc81 . Another famous resident (she couldn’t go there, no women could then) wrote:
It does have woods to the south and east, from which bears and moose occasionally appear 
Make sure you visit safeties and matches that are on the way, not just reaches. You want to make 100% sure they’d be a good fit and expressing interest at many smaller schools that know yourr 75%+ matters a lot.
If my film studies has served me well, that poet, however, did go on to form a strong association with a thereafter eponymous college in the region. Mount Holyoke, which she actually did attend, but from which she did not graduate, should also be mentioned for full context.
To that end, we also enjoyed visits to Northeastern, BU and Clark. Trinity is also in Conn, and the aforementioned Conn College. And if going to Amherst and not visiting the women’s colleges, Hampshire might be worth at last a quick stop.
The problem is that the Mass Pike is not exactly the “road less taken”
@gearmom Mystic makes me think about pizza and @merc81 just quoted my favorite poem. You two are appealing to everything my teenage self fancied =D>
Yes, I just read an article today that interest matters!
@Meddy There is the Mystic Pizza place that Julia filmed at if you fancy that. I haven’t gone there in years.
@OHMomof2 I was not in any way trying to imply go into Boston when speaking about Boston traffic. We call the outer rings, 495, 128, Boston traffic. I apologize if anyone thought I was suggesting to first go into the city of Boston and then head to Providence. And I find 146 into Providence to be a slower route at night. And it is like the rule of bank lanes. Whichever you choose will be slow and it is not easy to change.
She won’t have to worry about Hartford, Middleton to Warwick. New London can have traffic but it isn’t like New Haven. Currently this route at 5 pm has 2 minutes of traffic. Amherst to Providence is red at the 495 to 95 are and north of Providence entering the city.
Right now, because of traffic my navigation is suggesting avoiding the Mass turnpike altogether and traveling Amherst to Hartford on 91 and then take RT2 to Norwich, 395 north to 295. That is my rush hour navigation system calculation. Total trip 2 hers and 50 minutes.
From a local perspective, I tend to agree with @gearmom that Amherst is sort of in the middle of nowhere.
Even James Taylor made no mention of it on that “snowy first of December” when he was taking “the Turnpike from Stockbridge to Boston”.