I first learned about travel insurance when I scheduled a trip through our adoption agency to China to adopt our first beautiful baby girl. Because of the unsure nature of schedules with international adoption all the families were encouraged, if not required, to pay a small amount for trip cancellation insurance. What a piece of mind this provides, particularly during a stressful time. Since then I have bought travel insurance for a couple cruses and I always buy travel insurance in the form of foreign auto insurance when I drive into Mexico. My insurance agent informed me that most car insurance does not cover you once you cross the border and you need to buy a separate short term policy for this. Fortunately the place I go in Mexico has numerous insurance offices in a town before the border where you can get affordable insurance quotes for as little as one day.