Estimated Row Count of a Query ?

Hi,

We have a situation where we want to get the row count (as close as possible) to the Query we are trying to execute.  I wanted to know what would be the best way to obtain that count.  I tried to use the cardinality from explain plan, but that appears to be a far off values.

Is there any ways to obtain that count without executing the query ?

Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks,

Sanjay