Her hot-water cylinder also smelled awful after filling up with dirty water.
The Napier City Council had not notified her or her neighbours about any pipe work in the area.
Council water-supply asset manager Derek Wood said the dirty water came from a seldom-used pipe, which had to be used when three other pumps were shut down for the Meeanee Rd system upgrade.
Mr Wood said the grainy water was sediment that had been stirred up.
"It was similar to what would happen if you turned on a tap in your house which hadn't been used in some time," he said.
"While the water didn't look very appetising, it did not pose a health risk."
Despite that, some residents had to buy bottled water, run their taps for around 15 minutes or wait out the entire day before water flowed clear.
Greenmeadows resident Jackie Prichard bought boxes of water after putting water in a pot to cook pasta and finding dirty, "icky stuff", she wrote on the Hawke's Bay Today Facebook page.
One of her children was still not keen to drink water from the tap or have a shower or bath in it, she said.
Raewyn Wilson, of Tamatea, posted she did not realise at first there was a "fine black sand" in her water and had started drinking it.
"It put me off drinking tap water for two days," she said.
"Thumbs-down to NCC for not notifying us."
Mr Wood said the situation had not been expected but reducing such sediment build-up was one of the reasons the council carried out annual cleaning of the city's water main.