With guests to entertain, a reception space to decorate and programs to fold, I never bothered to check the weather report for my honeymoon. It wasn’t until I got to the Atlanta airport hours after getting hitched and noticed my gate was abnormally empty that I wondered what was up. A CNN weather report blared, “there’s a category three hurricane heading to Belize.” I pushed my worries aside and my new husband and I boarded the plane. It was us, and a handful of other people including a crew from The Weather Channel. Weather Channel host Jim Cantore sat to our right. “What are you guys doing here?” he asked. “Going on our honeymoon,” we gushed. Cantore proceeded to tell us that we should have driven to Charleston instead. He warned us about impending mud slides in the mountains of  Belize, but we weren’t going to let anything stop us from our dream honeymoon. Perhaps if we’d had travel insurance we wouldn’t have been so set on heading into the eye of the storm.

But often travel insurance seems silly. I mean, nothing’s going to happen, right? Think of your vacation as an investment. Deciding whether you want to protect that investment is up to you, but here are some points to consider:

The more you spend the more you’ll want to protect your trip. If you’ve only spent a couple hundred dollars on a nearby vacation rental, it may not be a big deal to you if the trip gets canceled. But if you’ve saved up for this vacation for ten years, travel insurance may offer peace of mind that you’ll get the vacation you’ve been dreaming of.

If you have a lot of connecting flights you may want to consider travel insurance. Certain types of travel insurance can help you if one of the legs of your trip is canceled. Anyone who has dealt with airlines knows it can be tough to get answers or find help.

Consider when you are traveling. If your trip is in the middle of an active hurricane season you may want to spring for insurance. If you’re heading to a place where hurricanes aren’t likely you may be OK skipping it.

Are you traveling with or planning to buy anything expensive? Certain types of travel insurance will cover your belongings. If they get lost or stolen your insurance will pay for them to be replaced.

If you prefer to have peace of mind when you travel, then travel insurance can be a great buy. But if you prefer to live life on the edge, then you may want to skip it and see what happens just like we did for our honeymoon.