Having been attracted to the new settlement at Port Phillip, he started with a pioneering party from the shores of Corio Bay, in August 1837, to explore the unknown country to the north-west, directing their course, in the first instance, to Mount Buninyong, near to which, in conjunction with his brother, Somerville Livingstone Learmonth, Mr. T. L. Learmonth subsequently entered on pastoral pursuits on the fine country the party then discovered farther to the north-west. In the following year the two brothers and some friends explored the course of the Loddon, and reached a prominent peak, which they afterwards called Ercildoune, from an old keep on the Scottish border associated with their ancestral history. Here the brothers established a second station.