To aid needy Haitians, Dr. Fred Landenwitsch is prepared to pedal his bicycle 3,150 miles, the equivalent of pedaling from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia 12.5 times, in six weeks.

		Seldom Seen, David Templeton's whimsical perspective on life and times in and around Washington County, appears weekly in Washington Sunday.

It's the equivalent of biking from Washington to Pittsburgh more than 131 times, Washington to Canonsburg 400 times, or around a high school track 12,600 times.

But in this case, Dr. Landenwitsch, of South Strabane, and his lifelong friend, Joe Vonderheide, of Cincinnati, will pedal from San Diego to St. Augustine, Fla., beginning with a back tire in the Pacific Ocean and ending with a front tire in the Atlantic, to raise $70,000 for a medical facility in LaCroix, Haiti.

This heartwarming and rending Christmas story focuses on good works in a land of dire need. It involves high adventure, which Dr. Landenwitsch and Mr. Vonderheide, the self-described Cycling Team of Haiti, will experience.

In this age when the Pittsburgh Steelers are bitter rivals with the Cincinnati Bengals, one tries overlooking the fact Dr. Landenwitsch is a native Cincinnatian and a graduate of the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine.

OK, Steelers fans can't overlook that negative. But we can assume his humanitarian dedication derives from his having lived in Washington County for 16 years.

Dr. Landenwitsch, 49, is a partner in Claysville Family Practice, which includes Dr. Jay Ziegler, Dr. Janine Rihmland and nurse practitioner Wilma Groethe. His partners are involved intimately in the project because they must fill in for him for six weeks.

That's no simple task, considering the practice serves 10,000 patients in Washington County, the West Virginia Panhandle and eastern Ohio.

But Dr. Ziegler said he was "absolutely 100 percent" behind his partner's quest to pedal the continent and build a clinic. "For some old men like him, it's a last hurrah," Dr. Ziegler said. "It's a chance of a lifetime."

After graduating from medical school, Dr. Landenwitsch completed his residency at Washington Hospital, then joined Dr. Ziegler's Claysville practice in 1992. He said he enjoyed rural medicine because patients have less access or are less willing to see medical specialists. So rural doctors treat a full range of ailments and injuries and perform minor surgery.

His Claysville training, he said, had valuable implications during his three trips to Haiti, the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation.

Pastor Vaugelas Pierre, a Haitian who started a school in LaCroix, educates 2,000 children and provides each with a daily meal. For many it's the only meal they eat in a land where children eat only once every two days.

Dr. Landenwitsch and other doctors and volunteers travel each year to LaCroix to provide medical care, build facilities, dig wells and provide humanitarian aid. He typically travels with members of the Thomas Presbyterian Church in Nottingham and Westminster Presbyterian Church in Upper St. Clair.

A team of medical professionals led by Dr. Dan Latanzi, an Upper St. Clair obstetrician/gynecologist, has built a clinic in LaCroix, where American doctors see 300 to 500 patients a day. Patients line up throughout the night, awaiting the clinic to open.

Doctors see people suffering from malnutrition, parasites and worms, malaria, tuberculosis, typhoid and AIDS.

Now Dr. Latanzi is building a maternity clinic to provide women of LaCroix with year-round prenatal and birthing services.

But once American doctors leave, native nurses are the only ones available to provide medical care.

"I felt the need to do more," Dr. Landenwitsch said.

Mr. Pierre has been busy recruiting a local doctor and dentist to work full time in LaCroix. So Dr. Landenwitsch hopes to raise $70,000, along with $10,000 available funds, to build a residence and medical facility for the doctor and dentist.

"It will greatly increase medical care there," he said. "The people are poor and malnourished. They live in huts with no electricity or running water, and people have to walk four or five miles to a stream to get water."

Two years ago, Dr. Ziegler said, he and Dr. Landenwitsch were in Las Vegas when Dr. Landenwitsch slipped $10 into a slot machine and eventually won a $200 jackpot. He cashed out immediately and wrote Mr. Pierre a check for $200, enough to buy two cows.

Dr. Ziegler said his partner's generosity made him feel so guilty that he donated $100 so Mr. Pierre could buy a third cow. "That's the kind of guy he is," Dr. Ziegler said.

Dr. Landenwitsch said his friend Joe, who designs and builds constructional components for houses, agreed to accompany him if it was scheduled in the winter, when construction is slow.

They plan to depart Jan. 29 on a southern route across the United States and maintain a pace of 80 to 100 miles a day. Theirs will be an "unsupported" trip, meaning they won't have someone trailing them in a vehicle. They'll carry sleeping bags, a tent and clothing for rain or snow, and plan to bed down in hotels along the way.

If they can't reach a hotel, they'll pitch the tent and dine on peanut butter, energy bars and water.

Dr. Landenwitsch said the adventure would be as exhilarating as it is exhausting. He's kept in shape by riding 30- and 50-mile expeditions along the Youghiogheny Trail in Fayette County.

But the six-week odyssey will require an ultra-marathoner's resolve to withstand long hours, sore feet and even sorer quadricep muscles. They'll encounter open highway, sizable hills and dangerous bends. So the trip requires top conditioning, if not some healthful insanity.

"I've done 100 miles on many occasions," he said, noting the need to consume thousands of calories a day. "Doing it consecutively will be the challenge."

Dr. Landenwitsch sent hundreds of letters seeking donations from friends, doctors, relatives and the general public and has collected about $28,000, including one $2,500 donation. He hopes to reach $70,000 before the trip begins.

Some donate money based on mileage covered. For example, a commitment of a penny a mile will bring a $31.50 donation if they reach St. Augustine.

Donations can be made on their Web site, www.tourdesaints.org.

As his dedication proves, Dr. Landenwitsch has experienced a full range of emotions in Haiti, from happiness to sorrow. Doctors successfully treat and cure many Haitians. But there are some, especially children, with disease too advanced to be saved.

Those circumstances will improve if Dr. Landenwitsch can raise enough money to build the facility for a doctor and dentist who would provide year-round health care for LaCroix's 5,000 people.

"Going from this life to that life is a major eye opener," he said. "You cannot come away from a place like Haiti without feeling something powerful."