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    See, up in there? For example, I haven't explored up in there yet. 
See the makings of an interesting rock formation? I may clear that out 
some so you can see it better. Haven't made up my mind. In the spring, 
this is just emerald green.
    Q. Greener than usual this August.
    The President. Pardon me?
    Q. It was greener than usual this August.
    The President. Yes, because of the rain.

[[Page 14]]

    Q. Mr. President, would you mind terribly if we would just let the 
truck pass so they can get some walking shots?
    The President. Not at all.
    Heidi, what are you doing?
    Q. I want to catch up to you. [Laughter]
    Q. Quite a little motorcade back there.
    Q. Do you ever--[inaudible]?
    Q. A lovely walk in the woods--[inaudible]--with motorized vehicles.
    Q. [Inaudible]
    The President. Yes, you do. Exactly. [Inaudible]
    Q. If I stub my toe, what will I do? [Laughter] [Inaudible]
    The President. It's easy to get a sense of the kind of the relief.
    It's about 90 foot in here, from the highest to the lowest point. 
Pretty good relief.
    Q. This part I remember, because you drove us down to here.
    The President. But you wouldn't ever envision this driving into the 
ranch.
    Q. Right.
    The President. That's what I like about it.
    Q. Were these roads here, or did you build these?
    The President. I built this one. The definition--I'll show you the 
definition of a road. The definition of a road is tire ruts on a ranch. 
And one of the things I assured Ron [Ron Fournier, Associated Press] is 
that we would build a road so it would become easily accessible. This 
is--I did not build this road. This is a road that the Engelbrechts 
built. But you have to maintain these things, obviously. The water will 
erode them out.
    The deer lay down in here. They feel protected. And then the turkey 
were right up here.

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. Make news, will you.
    This is the river right here. The middle fork of the Bosque. And 
right across the way is our neighbor. These are bur oaks. See these huge 
trees there? Aren't they spectacular?
    Q. These guys must create some nice fall foliage.
    The President. You get pretty good color here.
    See the tree with the leaves still on it?
    Q. Yes.
    The President. That's called a bois d'arc, and it's a real hard wood 
that they claim the Indians used for their--[inaudible]. They produce a 
big, green apple. That's a big--[inaudible].
    Q. So this is the line right here?
    The President. No, this is just--[inaudible].
    It's the middle fork of the Bosque. We have a mile and a half--
you'll see a creek down here.
    Q. Do you fish the river?
    The President. No, no. This river is real gravelly. And most of the 
time, you won't see water running on the surface. It runs underneath the 
gravel. You know, I hike up and down this river a lot, and you might run 
into--in August, you might run into a pool of water, but that's about 
it.
    Q. So we're 2.5 miles from what, the house?
    The President. Yes. We have walked about 2 miles.
    Q. A little exercise in the morning.
    The President. Absolutely.
    Q. Is everybody happy?
    The President. See the--that's real gravelly and shallow.
    Q. Do you periodically have rocks spread----
    The President. Yes, caliche, right. I did. We'll hike up out of here 
by a caliche pit. It's kind of a salty limestone that's used for road--
[inaudible].
    Q. You've got it right here on the ranch?
    The President. Yes. See out here, this is where most of the--
[inaudible]. And the creek that we're fixing to come up here, it's 
really hard to cross. So I built a low-water crossing. So you'll see a 
low-water crossing.
    Q. [Inaudible]
    The President. Well, ``low water'' means it's not a dam. In other 
words----
    Q. Like a ford?
    The President. Yes. The water runs continuously.
    Q. [Inaudible]--are never done, right?
    The President. These hardwoods are taking away a source of water. On 
a nice, relatively calm day, we'll come down and burn.
    Q. These cliffs are all----

[[Page 15]]

    The President. Yes, they do. We're paralleling them. We'll see some 
more dramatic--it's about 3\1/2\ miles all throughout here in the 
bottoms. Engelbrecht said he has seen water coming out of the creek and 
the river all across here, which is why you would never build down here.
    Those cedars, small cedars, were crowded up against the hardwoods 
and competing with the hardwoods for the water.
    Some of these are pecans out here. Great big pecan trees. The pecan 
is a fruit-bearing tree. We didn't have a very good pecan crop this 
year.
    See the white tree over there, the white bark? That's a sycamore, 
and they grow in the river.
    Q. You're quite the tree man.
    The President. I am a tree man.
    Q. The Audubon Society----
    The President. Good for you. Opens up your--when I say every day is 
Earth Day if you own your land, you're beginning to understand what I 
mean.
    Q. [Inaudible]
    Q. Skinny bits and saplings?
    The President. Those are little oaks and ashes. The sturdy will 
emerge. Here's where we worked yesterday. See how we opened up--that's 
our country over there on the right, on the other side of the creek. You 
couldn't see that. We opened it up, and now you have a sense of--that 
it's a part of our property.
    Q. When you find all these little----
    The President. You all right? You okay?
    Q. Yes.
    The President. Medical Gator. [Laughter]
    The numbers are the designated points. So, for example, so-and-so is 
at 50, they look on the map and find out where 50 is.
    Q. It's not for recreation?
    The President. No, the recreation part is the mileage.
    Q. What are the white patches over there?
    The President. That's where we burned.
    Q. Burned.
    The President. We will have seen about half the ranch. You can't 
cross--you'll see down here--I want you to see this river that it's just 
too wet to go across.
    Q. Is this, with the marker, is this where you run?
    The President. This is one of the trails. Some of these--we've got--
this is not a trail marker, this is not a running-trail marker here; 
it's an intersection.
    This is now the Rainy Creek. Where the Rainy Creek hits the middle 
fork of the Bosque is on our property, right up about a quarter mile 
that way. And now the Rainy Creek defines our northern border. And 
you'll see it up here.
    And there's five crossing points, and here is one of them.
    Q. Have we been on the eastern half of the ranch?
    The President. You have been on the eastern half of the ranch. 
You've seen--yes, left. I don't think we want to try to cross here, but 
we can stop here for a minute. I want you to see this.

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. And this will run about a mile and a half this way 
and then go a mile and a half----
    Q. This is not a fork where you fish?
    The President. Actually, I put some fish in here farther up, where 
there's a big, deep pool. And it's fun to come down here and fly fish. 
There's not a lot of fish--[inaudible].
    All right, we'll hike it up this hill here.
    Load up. Load up. Man, you better load up. We're going up the hill.
    Q. Oh, I'm good, sir.
    The President. You can handle it? Holly, get in here. Now, can you 
handle it?
    Q. I can, apparently. I've got to figure out how. Something to keep 
me occupied. [Laughter]
    The President. Exactly. You can read the instruction manual for a 
week. [Laughter]
    Q. That's what I did. That was one night. [Inaudible]
    Q. [Inaudible]
    The President. I finally recovered. These are all lacy oaks in here 
that you couldn't see. The cedars were crowding them out. These are 
going to be a beautiful stand of lacy oaks.
    Q. We'll have to give you a nickname--[inaudible].
    The President. Yes, exactly. See the cliffs over there?
    Q. Yes.

[[Page 16]]

    The President. Pretty dramatic stuff.
    Q. Looks like good hiking in there.
    The President. That's great hiking. There's a little hidden valley 
that you can go over there and--[inaudible]. Super Stretch, caliche.
    Q. You bulldoze it right out of there?
    The President. Yes. This is a good one to run, in August.
    Q. Ninety-eight degrees.
    The President. Hundred-degree for the run.
    Q. Reminds me too much of home. I couldn't do that.
    The President. That's right. But 90 degrees.
    Q. Wow, look at the hawk.
    The President. Those are big buzzards.
    Q. Turkey buzzards?
    The President. Yes, turkey buzzards. They're hoping one of us drops. 
[Laughter]
    Q. [Inaudible]--reporters.
    The President. It's good for you.
    Q. We're not cold anymore.
    The President. You will be, in a minute.
    Q. Oh, because of the wind?
    The President. Well, we're getting up top here.
    Q. Does the little hill have a name?
    The President. No, this one doesn't. But the next one over is Balkan 
Hill, for Condi Rice, who gave us the history of the Balkans in the 
middle of a 4-mile walk. I was impressed that she didn't break sentence 
during the--full up the hill.
    Q. [Inaudible]--Bosnia and Herzegovina going up the hill here.

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. See the area, right in there?
    Q. Yes.
    The President. That's a little hidden----
    Q. Have you been working back there?
    The President. We did, last year. You can walk up.
    Q. So with all this working, do you ever sit down and----
    The President. Relax?
    Q. Enjoy it and relax?
    The President. Yes, sometimes.
    Q. This is limestone, sir?
    The President. Yes. See how porous it is. There was a big dead tree 
right here, which we cut off, opened this up. We'll see--we're heading 
parallel to this little river, and I'll show you the headwaters of the 
river. It's spectacular.
    Can you envision me sitting here, on the rock, writing some poetry?
    Q. Yes.
    Q. That's what I see pretty much--writing the State of the Union--
[laughter]--longhand.
    The President. That's the state of my union.
    Q. Speaking of----
    The President. Yes, we're working on it.
    Q. Anything you want to sneak preview?
    The President. I think all you've got to do is call the White House 
staffers. They'll tell you, evidently. [Laughter] You know what I mean.
    Q. My fellow Americans.
    Q. That's what makes America great.

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    Q. Is that your property, or is that the other----
    The President. That's us. Go straight where those agents are down 
there. Those are agents down there--that you're not supposed to see.
    Q. Yes. [Laughter]
    The President. This is a great place to sit down and think. 
[Inaudible]

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. Be careful up here, seriously.
    On a nice evening, you've got a little bit of a western view and--
[inaudible]. We've got deer--[inaudible].
    Q. Look out, those first steps are moving.
    Q. Is it called--[inaudible]--Rainy Creek?
    The President. Yes.
    Q. Pretty wide for a creek.
    The President. Yes, it is, but there's a lot of water right now. But 
it won't be wide in a while.
    Q. How high up are we?
    The President. You know, I don't know how much higher--I'd say 90 
feet.
    All right, I just wanted you to see this. Holly?
    Q. Yes?

[[Page 17]]

    The President. Quit calling me Jeb. [Laughter]

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. Nice story. The--[inaudible]--and I went for a run in 
the campaign, summer of 2000. And we go in the pond, the river pool down 
there, the creek. And the next day we killed a water moccasin--
cottonmouth. That's the last time we jumped in there. [Laughter]
    See the cardinals?
    Q. Yes.

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. [Inaudible]--waterfall down there. I don't know what 
they are.
    Q. Isn't it pretty down here?
    Q. [Inaudible]
    The President. I don't know what they are, strawberries?
    Q. Something like that. I don't know.
    The President. [Inaudible]--wild clover. Anyway, this thing kind of 
meanders down. And there's a--well, you can see where it drops off. 
There's a waterfall down there. You've seen two of the seven canyons. 
And this is the one that goes up--remember that crossing where we just--
this goes all the way down there and drains into the creek right at the 
crossing. Pretty special.
    Q. Is there water--[inaudible]--down there?
    The President. I don't know what that is. I had never seen it.
    Q. [Inaudible]

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. Really? You've become kind of a matinee idol?
    Q. That goes without saying.
    The President. Yes, we took a vote. We'll keep him. They say he's 
big; he's big out there in the hinterland. Holly, do you want in?
    Q. I think I'm okay, thank you.
    The President. We've got about a half mile to go.
    Q. A half mile? Maybe I'll walk.

[At this point, the tour continued.]

    The President. A lot of water coming out that creek.
    Q. Good springs anywhere, sir?
    The President. Well, there's--yes, they do. And a lot of the----

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