Landscape Creation

I wish to make a landscape generating class.
I am goona implement simple features so an entire segment of a landscape can be loaded from text files or hard-coded into the game...either way

Now, I am not sure how to tackle the aspect of landscapes within a game.

I figure a landscape will be comprised of many segments, each segment containing the index and vertices of the landscape.
Then each frame, render the necessary segments given the z coord of the camera.

Each segment will contain a default texture which is to be used pretty much if nothing else is rendered on-top of this segment.

I will render each segment using an index, and i can't remember which method triangle-strp I think...point-to-point...But using an index should allow me to achieve detailed evelation.

Em I going about this the right way?
Any suggestions?