Tibet permits / chinese visa from Kathmandu for two Spanish travelers

Hello,

thanks very much for your time in advance.

We are 2 Spanish citizens traveling to Nepal from 15 March to 1st April 2013. One of the options we're considering is to do a Lhasa to Kathmandu overland tour. We have neither Chinese visa nor Tibet travel permits yet as we haven't decided whether we'll be going to Tibet or we'll simply stay in Nepal. All we have got so far are the Nepal visas.

Reading about the current situation on permits for Tibet in 2013 there seems to be some contradictory information on the subject. Some sites state it's going to be impossible to travel to Tibet during March 2013 and some others say the opposite, i.e. they state it's now even easier as the requirement is now that there are at least 2 travelers of the same nationality as opposed to last year's 5.

Our situation is as follows:

- we arrive in Kathmandu on 16th March 2013 (Saturday).
- so far the idea is to shop around on 17th March 2013 (Sunday) and see whether we stay in Nepal or we venture into the Tibet thing.
- if we were to go for the Tibet option, we'd then contact a Tibet tour operator and see whether we can arrange permits (including Chinese visa) on site.
- we "only" have two weeks to complete the tour, so the expectation is that it should take no longer than 1-3 days to get the permit and set off.

Does this sound feasible?

Should we arrange a Chinese visa upfront just in case? Would that help speed up the process once in Kathmandu?

Are tourists banned from Tibet on March 2013 as some sites suggest and therefore we shouldn't even bother looking?

Again, thanks very much for any useful info/tips!