Hike Tuolumne Peak and Mount Hoffman Yosemite National Park, CA

Aug 14, 2024 — For the last day of our Sierra trip, Chris and I traversed from Tuolumne Peak to Mount Hoffman. The hike begins within Yosemite National Park at the May Lake Trailhead. A narrow spur road leads off Tioga Road to reach this trailhead, a parking lot that's pretty small considering the high visitation to May Lake. We also later learned that there is a surprisingly popular route up to Mount Hoffman, a trail that is not advertised but is clearly well-known.

We started north on the forested trail, occasional views toward our traverse to come visible above. We kept to the east side of May Lake and followed the Glen Aulin - May Lake Trail. When this trail bent east, we spotted the remains of a no longer maintained route that heads north. We were surprised to find that this was actually a pretty well-built trail that was clearly decommissioned, complete with switchbacks and stone staircase construction. There was a spot that was difficult to follow as it crossed a creek, but it was easy going otherwise. Shortly after some tight switchbacks, the trail petered out at a grassy slope, and then the ascent became a matter of taking the slope and keeping just below the very bouldery ridge crest.

After a few hundred feet of ascending this slope with excellent views to the south into Yosemite National Park, we reached the saddle separating The Bowmaiden from Tuolumne Peak. It's not hard to accidentally make the hiking more difficult here because there are tons of massive boulders, but we were able to locate a relatively easy option that stuck to sandier terrain and minimized the amount of tedious boulder-hopping. I recommend staying well below the crest. There was a short ridge walk to reach the summit of Tuolumne Peak, which required some Class 2 scrambling. Being a prominent summit, the views to the surrounding valleys, the Clark Range, and various peaks to the north near Tioga Pass were excellent.

We backtracked to the saddle and headed south toward The Bowmaiden, a provisionally named peak that juts out above a cute little glacial lake. The approach initially didn't exceed Class 2, but when the ridgeline bent west it wraps around the little lake above a wild slick granite face on a precariously narrow knife edge. I tested my headspace and decided I wasn't interested. Although the scrambling didn't appear all that difficult, the exposure is serious. Chris seemed like he wanted to go for it, but chose not to do so alone. Instead we dropped south and wrapped around this unnecessary obstacle. It was another steep ascent up to The Bowmaiden, where we got a nice viewpoint.

Unnamed Peak 10648 was next, just another stroll along the ridgeline to a Class 2 summit. Ahead we could see Mount Hoffman and its steep and bouldery northeastern face. We dropped down from Peak 10648 and made our way to the base of its slope. Rather than ascend directly, since this was reportedly a route requiring dangerous scrambling/climbing, we kept left and used a more tame-looking part of the slope. At the top was some boulder-hopping and dodging to overcome the rim.

We immediately saw a couple of people wandering around after reaching the rim on the eastern reaches of Mount Hoffman. Neither of us had expected to see anyone out here, but we also didn't realize there was a trail to the summit of Mount Hoffman. Headed toward the peak, we located a social trail through the tundra and scrambled up the Class 2 slabs to Mount Hoffman's summit, where many parties were gathered. This was an excellent lookout point toward Clouds Rest and Half Dome.

We dropped south on the trail and used this to descend from Mount Hoffman. Overall it's very easy to follow with the help of cairns, but often the eroded slope has multiple social trail options and it's sometimes easy to lose. The trail bends north and makes its way through the cliffy southern slopes of Mount Hoffman down to May Lake, where we picked up the May Lake Trail and headed back to our cars.