In 1867, the writer, mathematician and theologian Lewis Carroll visited Russia. He visited St. Petersburg and Moscow, and from Moscow went to Nizhny Novgorod on the newly laid railway. In Nizhny Novgorod, the English guest visited a fair and a theater, a church and a mosque, admired the river panorama from the Kremlin towers. Carroll described his two-day stay in the Volga capital on August 6 and 7, 1867 in his diary, which became the basis for the script of the film.