I'm DM for a group of high schools students, all of whom are relatively new to the game. They are in Omu, but haven't entered the Fane or the Tomb yet.
They started at level 5, with characters from their previous adventures. I replaced Syndra Silvane with an NPC who had been a quest giver for them previously (The Seer from the Tier 1 SKT AL season).
I had worked out a whole system to "simplify" tracking water, insect repellent, and exhaustion during the jungle exploration. It still felt rather tedious, and I eventually dropped most of it.
I rolled for weather and random encounters ahead of time, which helped, but it did become a bit of a slog. After my group left Hrakhamar, we shifted to 5 day exploration chunks. I hand waved moved of the encounters in a chunk; we only played out those I thought were interesting. If I had it to do over again, from the beginning I would have used the random encounter rolls as inspiration, but adjusted things for more interest, and done more to connect those encounters to the wider story of Chult and/or the death curse.
None of our players had been resurrected, so the death curse was only an issue in terms of saving the Seer, and that didn't seem to add a lot of pressure on them.
As mentioned above, there is a real dearth of clues and hints. I ended up adding a bunch. I used devices like finding a dead adventurer's diary, messages from the Seer/quest giver, and visions received by an NPC cleric. (I turned one of the prisoners in Hrakhamar into a Forge Cleric, to give them a guide option that wasn't as worthless as Musharib, and then gave I'm visions). I would encourage you to sort out a method for occasional brief communication with the quest-giver (whether that is Syndra or someone else.). In our case, the Seer has a Pseudodragon familiar who had served as an intermediary before they arrived in Chult. With someone else I would encourage sending stones or some other method.
I spent some time customizing the Red Wizards in Omu, to give them a little more personality and flavor. I'm not sure it was entirely worth the effort I put into it, but at the very least it helped me see them as individual characters and not bland targets.
Good note keeping in Omu in terms of who finds the cubes when is important.
If players start at a level above level 1, think about adjusting the abilities/CR of the guide they choose (if they choose one). My crew picked Musharib, and he proved to be a big liability in combat situations. Companion NPCs shouldn't outshine the party, but Musharib was so far below their level that they were constantly frustrated with him.
My crew has generally not done well with the puzzles in the various dungeons. The clues and hints are generally just too opaque.
