Dortmund, Germany - The town of Nordhorn in north-western Germany is set amidst a landscape of charming farmhouses and old oak trees. But occasionally, modern technology is visible in the form of crude oil pumps scattered across the land.

Motorists holidaying in the region will experience the old and the new travelling around Nordhorn and anyone with a little more time on their hands can drive across the border to the Netherlands to experience van Gogh country.

Oil pumps are one of the region's main features. Visitors can find out more about them with the help of the new electronic Dynamic Audio Geo Information System for Tourists (DAGIT) which consists of a small computer attached to a car's radio.

"The unique thing about DAGIT is that it does not just guide you around the countryside with the aid of an audible voice, it also provides information about sights to be seen along the way," says Manuela Westhuis who is managing the project.

One of the system's routes takes travellers 112 kilometres through the district of Grafschaft Bentheim on the border to the Netherlands.

It's one of three routes covering the area, but they all lead to Bourtanger Moor-Bargerveen nature reserve.

DAGIT adjusts itself to the motorists' speed. However, faster travellers receive less information than those who take time to enjoy the sights.

Around 50 DAGIT machines in the region can be borrowed after paying a deposit.

The shortest route is 87 kilometres long while the middle route takes motorists on a 99-kilometre long journey.

Geeste-Gross Hesepe is the location for the Emsland Moorland Museum that tells visitors the history and culture of the region.

There are also about a dozen, large turf cutting machines at the museum's entrance that once scowered the landscape here up until the 1970s.

"Most of the machines were built here in the Emsland region and are unique to the area," says the museum's Ansgar Becker.

If you have some more time on your hands, try taking the 10 kilometre bicycle ride from the museum along the Moorland Energy Path that ends at the crude oil and natural gas museum in the town of Twist.

The path informs cyclists about how turf, oil and gas are formed and extracted from the earth as well as how the moor is being restored to a more natural state.

Across the border in Veenoord/Nieuw-Amsterdam is the house where Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh spent September to December 1883 with a local family.

During this short period, he created drawings of the dark brown moor landscape as well as paintings such as the Old Woman at the Spinning Wheel.

Visitors to the van Gogh house can view the bed in which he slept and a palette that look as if the painter had just stepped out of the room. However, there are no original van Gogh works on display.

Internet: www. grafschaft-bentheim-tourismus. de, www. emsland. com, www. naturpark-moor. de, www. pionierrouten. eu, www. moormuseum. de (dpa)