thumb|Location of Huatulco in Oaxaca
Huatulco (; wah-TOOL-coh), formally Bahías de Huatulco, centered on the town of La Crucecita, is a tourist development in Mexico. It is located on the Pacific coast in the state of Oaxaca. Huatulco's tourism industry is centered on its nine bays, thus the name Bahías de Huatulco, but has since been unofficially shortened to simply Huatulco. Huatulco has a wide variety of accommodation from rooms for rent, small economy hotels, luxury villas, vacation condominia, bed and breakfasts, as well as several luxury resorts standing on or near the shores of Tangolunda Bay. The Camino Real Zaashila (formerly the Omni Zaashila), Quinta Real Huatulco, Las Brisas (formerly a Club Med), Dreams Resort & Spa (formerly the Royal Maeva then the Gala hotel), and the Barceló (formerly the Sheraton hotel) are examples of the most popular larger resorts in the area.
Huatulco is located where the foothills of the Sierra Madre del Sur mountains meet the Pacific Ocean, approximately east of Acapulco, Guerrero. The population is 50,000.
History
Legends say the Toltecs and Cē Ācatl Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl came from this area. Quetzalcoatl, according to a later legend, erected an enormous and indestructible cross. Various people have passed through this area, including the Chatinos, the Zapotecs and the Mexicas,
After the Spanish Conquest, Huatulco thrived as a port under Hernán Cortés's control serving as a vantage point for Spanish galleons and a distribution centre for supplies on the Pacific coast. The latter half of the 16th Century saw Huatulco attacked by Francis Drake and Thomas Cavendish—both of whom left their prints on the region's history and legends that continue to this day.
The Bahias de Huatulco are a series of nine bays and numerous small coves stretching along 26 kilometers of jagged coastline, including 36 white sandy beaches. The most centrally located bay is Bahía de Santa Cruz, which is just south of the town of La Crucecita. It is also the center of commercial and tourist activities, with a large pier where cruise ships dock. Many resort offerings can be found here such as hotels, craft shops, discothèques, bars, restaurants, excursion agencies, sailboat excursions as well as scuba diving, snorkeling and jet skis for rent. The Capilla de Santa Cruz is where many weddings and baptisms are celebrated next to the sea. Playa Santa Cruz is the best known of the beaches here. It is 250 meters long, with soft white sand and turquoise blue water.) International Certification as a sustainable tourist area. Huatulco was the first sustainable tourist community in the Americas and the third worldwide, after Bali in Indonesia and Kaikōura in New Zealand, to receive this prestigious award because of its development programs for a culture environmentally friendly to conserve its natural resources. Bahía Órgano is named for the cacti that grow there. It is 240 meters long and only accessible by boat. Bahía Maguey is about 1/2 km long and is accessible by car. Both these bays have fine, white sand and waters of various colors of blue and green. Bahía Cacaluta and Bahía Chachacual are only accessible by boat, and there are absolutely no human constructions of any kind. Bahía San Agustín is the furthest west and the largest of all the bays. It has 1 km of beaches between 20 and 80 meters wide. There are also small islets inside the bay itself.
Climate
Sunshine can be expected about 330 days a year with the average temperature of . The dry season extends from December to May and the rainy season is from June to November. The amount of precipitation has a definite effect on the local vegetation, being brownish in the dry season and very green in the rainy season.