Bon Voyage! Investing overseas could take your portfolio on a trip up, up, and away.

The plane ride to Hong Kong is too long, and you get seasick on anything smaller than the QE2. Even if you don't know who Fodor is and don't care what they're wearing in Paris this season, there are lots of reasons to go abroad this year . . . with your money, that is.

After a record-breaking year for stateside markets, few investors may be tempted to take their portfolios on a foreign trip. Why bother when results have been so good at home?

Here's one reason: A study of world markets between 1970 and 1992 by Chicago research firm Ibbotson Associates concluded that a portfolio investing up to 35 percent in foreign stocks was less risky and earned 1.2 percent more each year than one invested exclusively in U.S. issues. Even though past performance is no guarantee of future returns, consider that the study included some of the finest years in the U.S. market's history.